


Connect The Dots

by dnai



Series: Connect the Dots Verse [1]
Category: Criminal Minds (US TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Canon-Typical Violence, Canonical Character Death, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Internalized Homophobia, Multi, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, other relationships will probably come up, the whole team are soulmates, the whole team needs a hug
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-12-28
Updated: 2018-12-30
Packaged: 2019-02-22 22:55:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 18
Words: 27,403
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13176936
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dnai/pseuds/dnai
Summary: In a world where everyone is born with the first sentence their soulmate will say to them on their skin, the last thing anyone expects is for someone to have six marks.OrThe BAU team needed each other long before they became a team and the universe needs them to know that.





	1. Prologue Part One - Aaron

**Author's Note:**

> Warning for descriptions of child abuse and an unhealthy marriage

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning for descriptions of child abuse and an unhealthy marriage.

If Aaron Hotchner was anything, it was strong. If Aaron Hotchner was not anything, it was cynical. 

The soul marks has been there as long as he could remember, and as long as he could remember, people were coming up with reasons why it was wrong. First, it was his father, questioning how his five year old, his perfect (though Aaron was never treated as a perfect son) boy had six soul marks. According to his father, it didn’t mean anything. Six soul marks or not, no Hotchner child would grow up to do anything except meet his one soulmate and marry her. 

If you asked him, Aaron Hotchner never knew his father. At least, he didn’t know the man he was before he became the type of man who would threaten a ten year old with a drink in one hand and a cigarette in the other. Aaron Hotchner refused to accept that his father had always been this way until he was seventeen years old. His soul marks were all still there, all six of them, but people rarely saw them. From the bright purple one on his wrist to the muted orange on his hip, they were there, and Aaron loved them. He hadn’t heard the words yet, but he wasn’t the only one who hadn’t by any means. 

Six sentences, small enough that they appeared to be lines, were on Aaron Hotchner’s body, and when he looked at them, he thought of a better future than the one he was currently in. Every time his father looked at the one visible line he had with a kind of cruel satisfaction, Aaron thought of the five other lines, the ones that meant as much to him as ever, but that he couldn’t bring himself to acknowledge anymore. His father seemed happy with his choice, at least, when he was sober, he seemed happy with the choice. 

When he drank, Aaron’s father became the man who sent Aaron running for cover, even as he got stronger and his father got slower. He demanded to see the soul marks that Aaron kept so carefully hidden away. He demanded to know that they were gone, and when he saw that they weren’t, violence always followed. 

Aaron Hotchner had six soul marks, but when he was thirteen, his mother stood up for him for the first and only time. His father had been drinking (more and more the older Aaron got, the closer to meeting his soulmate). 

“It’s not natural! Someone needs to show him that before it’s too late!” 

“Burning his mark off isn’t going to fix this!” 

He heard a slap and a gasp, sharper than he remembers hearing from his mother, before he heard his father slam back down into his chair and say, “You can’t protect him from what needs to be done forever.”

“Maybe not,” his mother whispered “but he can.” 

For the next four years, Aaron hoped his mother would do something to indicate those words hadn’t been a dream, but she never stood up to his father again. 

—

When Aaron was seventeen, he met Haley. She was beautiful and refreshing and kind - everything that home hadn’t been for years. They talked about everything, it seemed, except soul marks. Haley, he learned after six months, didn’t have a soul mark. Aaron had known she wasn’t his soulmate as long as they’d known each other, but he didn’t care. One of the sentences on his body didn’t belong to her, but Aaron Hotchner had all but given up on his soulmates. He hadn’t given up on Haley. Haley was loving and intelligent and there in a way no one had been there for him in a very long time. So when he proposed to Haley right out of college, it felt right, even though there was no soul mark, no sign from the universe telling them that it was right. 

When he was an attorney, everything seemed perfect. They lived together, in a house that was just a little too big for them, and though neither had ever said anything, they knew they wanted their family to grow into the house. Aaron came home to his wife every night, and Haley loved him in a way he’d never thought a wife could love her husband. 

Then he became an agent. Even before the BAU, the long hours made Aaron tense and Haley irritable and suspicious. Accusations passed Haley’s lips more often than kisses did, and Aaron suddenly felt the need to cover his marks again, because they were a reminder that Haley was not, and could not be, perfect for him. They were a reminder to Haley that someone better (actually six someones) waited in Aaron’s future. A favorite accusation of hers was that Aaron was only using her to pass the time before he found the people who would truly complete him. 

So Aaron hid the soul marks, and any hopes he had that his soulmates wouldn’t get in the way of him and Haley, because even when they were nowhere, Haley saw them as a threat. 

A part of him wished that he was like Haley - she didn’t have a soul mark, but she was content with her place in the world, and she didn’t feel anything near the pull he felt to his job. Even as he worked in law enforcement, he didn’t find the clear purpose that he desperately wanted to have. Then he met the first of his soulmates. 

David Rossi was exactly the type of man that Aaron would’ve expected to have led with, “Excuse me, I’m looking for the case agent?” when talking to his soulmate for the first time. He hadn’t expected to meet his first soulmate on a crime scene, but when he thought about it, it made sense. He’d been more attached to the job than he had been to his wife for quite a while, it made sense that the job would be where he would meet the first of six people who Haley (and now, he, after talking to Dave some more) thought could replace her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! If there are any warnings you think need to be tagged, please don’t hesitate to let me know! Warnings will be in the notes at the beginning of each chapter. I’ll be discussing a lot of canon events in this fic, and if anyone needs it, i’ll be more than happy to write up an undetailed summary of a chapter, just let me know!


	2. Prologue Part Two - Spencer

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mentions of Reid’s canon home life and bullying. 
> 
> The next several chapters will be the background chapters for each of the team members from season 7 (because they’re my favorite team). I hope you enjoy reading this chapter as much as I enjoyed writing it.

If Spencer Reid was anything, he was curious. If Spencer Reid was not anything, it was careless. 

Spencer had never questioned the fact that the six lines, neatly arranged on his shoulder, were a part of him and deserved to be treated as such. He looked at the words sometimes, but since he’d already committed them to memory, he preferred to look at the different colors. 

There was a bright purple line. He wondered what form that brightness would take in his soulmate. The blue, so dark it was almost black, seemed serious in a way Spencer could understand. The green, dark and vibrant at the same time reminded him of action, and something told him that the person who that line belonged to would never be content to stay still for long. He wondered what that meant for him and the five other people who had his line. 

The yellow line seemed like the softest of the lines. He was sure he would be close to that soulmate from the beginning in a way he still was unsure of with the blue and green lines. The red line seemed angry and hurt and Spencer wished he knew how to make this person he didn’t know yet feel better. The muted orange line was one Reid hadn’t quite figured out his impression of yet. All of the lines, whether he had a clear impression of who their owners were or not, were more than welcome on his skin from the day they appeared. 

In his reading, he came across people who had more than one soulmate, but he had yet to discover another person who had six. He learned that some people had platonic soulmates as well as romantic. He learned that some soulmates never started a romantic or sexual relationship. In a way, this was a relief, because this way there was no pressure for the people he was sure he would come to love. They could love him on their own terms, and he could love them on his. 

For all the research he’d done on soulmates and marks, he had yet to find a case where a pair of soulmates didn’t eventually find a place in each others’ lives. The thought was comforting, though it didn’t stop him from wishing for the day he would meet his soulmates to come faster (days, plural, he corrected himself).

At school, people didn’t seem to care whether you’d found your soulmate yet or not, and despite having confirmation that six people waited in his future, Spencer was lonely. He was by far the youngest person at his high school, and while everyone else was ignoring their soul marks in favor of more physical comforts, he didn’t even have a friend. 

So when Alexa Lisben wanted to meet him behind the field house, he was feeling more than a little bit vulnerable, and he was caught off guard in the worst kind of way when he found not only Alexa, but several other girls and the entire football team. Being stripped was the worst of it, but when the group of tormentors saw the soul marks on his shoulder, it got worse. 

“Six people are going to fall in love with him? I was starting to think he didn’t have a mark at all. It wouldn’t have surprised me.” 

“It’ll be a miracle of any of them can stand having a soulmate like him.” 

“There’s no way in hell those marks are real.” 

Reid tried not to listen to them as they debated how they could figure out if the marks were real. It was well past nine before they gave up on scrubbing the extra lines off him, and then they just left him there, tied to the goal post. When he got home, it was past midnight and his shoulders were still red from where they’d been rubbed raw. Angry, like the red soul mark. He wondered what color his soulmates had for him. A part of him wasn’t sure he wanted to know. 

His mom didn’t realize he was late. His shoulders still ached as he tried to find sleep that night, and the only comfort that came to him was carefully tracing the sentences that would eventually be said by the people he was destined to spend his life with. Whatever capacity that was in, Spencer was sure it would be better than his current situation. 

The redness eventually faded from his skin. The marks did not.  
—

His mother was getting worse, and Reid knew it. The sanitarium was the safest place for her, he knew that, but he also knew that she didn’t handle change well and that the transition would be rough. He was still in college (granted, he was working on his second doctorate, but he was still in college), he was barely the same age as the freshmen at his school, and he’d been studying there for five years. People were meeting their soulmates now, despite only having one, and Reid couldn’t help but wonder when any of the six people whose words were permanently written on his shoulders were going to walk into his life. 

School was better for him now that he at least looked old enough to be there, and being surrounded by people who actually wanted an education was a huge step up from where he’d been in high school. He had a friend (? He still wasn’t entirely sure) in Ethan, and he didn’t mind the loneliness that still lingered quite as much. 

By the time he was finished with the third doctorate, Reid was twenty-three, and Jason Gideon was taking an interest in him. The courses at the Academy were interesting and challenging, but the physical requirements were so difficult that, more often than not, they ended in a waiver. 

His first day at the BAU, he heard Aaron Hotchner say, “Welcome to the unit. I’ve heard a lot about you.” 

The dark blue sentence, the leftmost line on his right shoulder, belonged to Aaron Hotchner. And on Aaron’s right hand (his non-dominant hand, Reid noticed) was his line. “Thank you, sir. I’ve heard incredible things about this team.” 

Little did he know, he’d be meeting two more of his soulmates very shortly.


	3. Prologue Part Three - Emily

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Emily Prentiss was never a woman to shy away from a challenge.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m planning to finish up the prologue chapters over the next few days, then I’m hoping to make the rest of the chapters longer than these. Enjoy!

Emily Prentiss had never believed that once you met your soulmate, everything was magically fine. She’d never believed that a soulmate meant a romantic entanglement, mostly because she could hardly imagine herself in one relationship, let alone six of them. 

For Emily, the lines were evenly spaced along her collarbones. A small, cramped font gave the sentences the appearance of being solid lines, and they were Emily’s favorite part about herself. Part of her wondered if that should worry her - her favorite part of herself was a symbol of another person (six other people, really.) 

With how much she and her mother moved around, Emily found herself taking solace in two things: soul marks and reckless decisions. She didn’t feel an ounce of guilt for the effect her actions could’ve had on her mother. Italy was no different, until she met Matthew. 

She hoped that she would feel as safe with at least one of her soulmates as she did with Matthew. The boy who, like her, hadn’t met his soulmate yet, but unlike her, didn’t want to. The way he saw it, he didn’t want to be fixed in the way Emily seemed to think her soulmate would fix her. She felt his anger and, once she realized it was on her behalf, it reminded her of the orange sentence at the top of her left collarbone, and she wondered why. 

Matthew was convinced that Emily didn’t need to be fixed, unlike everyone else in the church. Unlike her mother. Unlike Emily. More than anything, Emily wanted someone to see her for who she was - and really, she was a mess. She loved Matthew, but she needed something other than his blind optimism. She needed someone to tell her that she needed help, and she wanted someone to help her out of the cycle she’d found herself in. She’d ruined Matthew. His parents were right. He was better off without her. 

Above all, Emily wanted someone who wouldn’t let her ruin them. And if she was lucky, her soulmates were those people. 

With Interpol, she didn’t tell anyone about her marks. She wore professional, perfectly fitting pants and blazers that hid everything except the closed off, professional persona she wanted her fellow agents to see. When she went undercover as Lauren Reynolds, though, there wasn’t a good way to hide her soul marks from Ian Doyle. Luckily, he’d never accepted that someone could love more than one person. So when she told him that she’d never be able to love any of them the way she loved him, the lie passed through her lips with difficulty and made into Doyle’s mind easily. 

Faking Declan’s death had been the hardest thing she’d ever done. It had taken so much to protect Declan from everyone that wanted to hurt his father by hurting him. She felt like she’d left a piece of herself in that cul-de-sac with Declan and Louise, even if she was able to check up on them. She loved D.C., she loved living in the States. She loved everything about her life, but she still worried that it could be taken away from her, like Italy, like all the tentative lives she’d ever made in any of the places she went with her mother. She worried about Declan, she worried about Lauren Reynolds and all the other people who had been involved in capturing Doyle. 

Lauren Reynolds was supposed to be dead, but Emily was afraid that she wouldn’t be able to stay that way. 

Being with the BAU was supposed to be a fresh start, where she didn’t have to worry about her past (or to some extent, her future) and she had the chance to focus on her present. Ian Doyle was nowhere near her, Declan was safe, Lauren was dead, and Emily was free. When Emily Prentiss walked into Aaron Hotchner’s office, she wasn’t focused on the dark blue sentence on her collarbone. 

She wondered why he seemed surprised when she said her first sentence to him. “Agent Hotchner? I’m Agent Emily Prentiss.” Her first words to him were an introduction - surely he knew who she was? Then she caught a glimpse of his hand. Across his thumb was a short green line - a line that stopped just short of revealing her name. There, in the green ink, were only three words. Not even a hint that his soulmate was an agent. If he’d had it as long as she’d had hers, it had only given him a hint as to what he would one day become. 

“How do you do? Oh! You’re Ambassador Prentiss’ daughter!” In Emily’s experience, having her mother’s reputation precede her was rarely a good thing, but Agent Hotchner didn’t seem to mean anything by it - it was simply his closest connection to her. The dark blue of the line almost exactly matched his suit. 

Emily was somehow grateful that she’d met her first soulmate with very little fanfare, because she wasn’t sure how well she or Agent Hotchner (Hotch, she reminded herself) would’ve handled anything too sudden. 

Another problem that appeared to have resolved itself was Emily’s concern that she would meet her soulmate while she was with the BAU team and they wouldn’t understand her long hours or the cases she would sometimes bring home with her, as she had when she was with Interpol. 

Of course, first she had to convince her... soulmate? hopefully boss? that she belonged in the unit, which wouldn’t be easy. 

But no one had ever known Emily Prentiss to shy away from a challenge. This was the woman who had tricked an international criminal, kept said international criminal away from his son, and put her life back together after being ripped away from Italy, the first place she’d felt at home in a long time. And this was the woman who would earn her spot on the BAU team, and though she didn’t know it yet, she would meet four more of her soulmates the following morning


	4. Prologue Part Four - Derek

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is the chapter with the referenced rape/non-con
> 
> there’s nothing graphic, and nothing beyond what we learn in 2.12 Profiler, Profiled, but please be careful while reading.

If Derek Morgan was anything, it was dedicated. If Derek Morgan was not anything, it was weak. 

Derek wanted to believe in his soulmates, he really did, but besides the faded blue line on his mother’s wrist, he never heard people talking about their marks. His sisters had marks, but they hadn’t met their soulmates yet, and they weren’t the interesting ones. Derek was the one that had six sentences on the inside of his wrist. No one he knew had ever heard of someone having more than one mark, and if they had, they didn’t tell him about it. 

His parents were always kind about it. They knew that the marks on his wrist weren’t going to magically disappear if they ignored them, so instead, they talked about it. They talked about what having a soulmate was like for them, and they made sure he knew how happy they were that he was going to have six people who loved him just as much as they loved each other. 

Then his father was killed. He got angrier, started to resent the marks. He made sure to never draw attention to his hands. Chicago winters became his solace, a time in which it was cold enough to keep his hands hidden in gloves, and a few weeks where he could practice by himself, away from the watchful eyes of Carl Buford. 

Just like he hid the marks, he hid the weekends and what happened. He began to see his secrets as worth more than his life. At least, they were worth more than his life where it currently was. 

Buford had a mark. Eventually, Morgan stopped hoping that someone would come and save him and started hoping that whoever’s words Buford had, they would not have to suffer the same way he did. He spent his prayers not on himself, but on the idea that the words belonged to someone who could put up a fight, who had less to lose than Morgan did. 

And when he finally pulled himself off of the streets and into college, Derek Morgan left Chicago, and he was determined to leave his memories of Carl Buford at the youth center. 

His world crashed again for a while when he had to stop playing football. Eventually though, he welcomed the opportunity to leave behind every last piece of him that was tied to Buford. 

His time with the Chicago Police Department wasn’t perfect by any means, but he learned his place. His place was in a position where he could help people, where he could take down people like Buford. 

His soul marks became less of a burden for him. They became less of something he needed to hide and more something he could be proud of. He was starting to get back everything his childhood had taken from him. He was meeting people with stories, good stories of their soulmates and how they met. His sisters eventually met their soulmates, but to Derek’s surprise, they didn’t end up marrying them. 

Really, he shouldn’t have been that surprised, since he had six marks. He was still by far the most uncommon situation most people had seen. 

 

Eighty percent of the population had a single mark. Twelve percent had no mark. Seven percent had two soulmates (usually one romantic and one platonic). Less than one percent of the population had more than two soulmates, and it got more uncommon the higher the number went. In fact, it wouldn’t have surprised Derek if he found out he was the only person in Chicago who had six marks. 

Working with a bomb unit was a mix of exhilarating and terrifying for Morgan. Beyond the threat of leaving his mother and sisters behind, he didn’t want to know what would happen if he died before he got the chance to meet his soulmates. He knew from experience that their marks would fade, but he didn’t want to think about six people that he didn’t know going through one of the worst pains in the world just because he made a bad decision and got himself killed. It was more than an emotional pain, his mother had told him when he was seventeen and finally got the courage to ask. There was a physical pain that went with it that she’d been unable to describe to him, and, quite frankly, Derek was relieved. 

He knew there was a high chance that he would not be the first of his soulmates to die, so he would have to experience the pain at least once, but until it happened, Derek definitely did not want to know. 

Morgan’s work with the FBI quickly secured a spot in his mind as “still terrifying and probably life-threatening, but not as actively dangerous as working with bombs that were, more than often enough, armed.” 

His first day with the BAU was interesting, to say the least. 

Gideon was a man who Morgan had come to respect, but not one that he’d come to trust quite yet. Aaron Hotchner was a man who Morgan hadn’t had the chance to form an opinion about yet, which wasn’t exactly surprising because he’d never spoken to the man. 

When Morgan did get the chance to speak to him, Hotch spoke with a friendly tone, but one that still conveyed a level of professionalism. “Welcome to the unit, Agent Morgan.” 

It took a moment for Morgan to realize that the words Hotch had just said were written in a dark blue on his wrist, partly because he’d heard similar words from countless other people during his career, and partly because he never expected a man like Agent Hotchner to be one of his soulmates. 

This first case would be interesting, without a doubt. Morgan just wasn’t exactly sure he wanted to find out exactly how the case would be interesting. “Thank you, sir. I look forward to it.” 

Aaron Hotchner was surprised. Derek could tell, but it almost seemed like he was thinking about something else. Maybe Morgan wasn’t the first soulmate Aaron had met. Maybe he was comparing Morgan to someone else. 

Or maybe, Hotch was just thinking “Oh. Here we go again,” as he explained some of the team protocols.


	5. Prologue Part Five - JJ

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> JJ, in doing some things, further establishes her place as a fictional character that i would die for without hesitation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you guys enjoy! Only two more prologue parts! 
> 
> Special thanks to Nye for the knowledge that cornfield parties are a thing and other fun small town pennsylvania tidbits.

If JJ was anything, she was determined. If JJ was not anything, it was disloyal. 

Small towns in Pennsylvania aren’t known for being interesting. They’re mostly known for being full of corn. For JJ, this was just about right. Cornfields. And everyone in town knowing your business. Everyone knew about what happened at every cornfield party (JJ never got the appeal, but went anyway.) Everyone knew who was dating who (and whether or not they were soulmates). 

So of course, everyone in town knew that Jennifer Jareau had six soulmates. And everyone in town not-so-secretly wondered why none of her soulmates had come around. It wasn’t likely that any of them lived in town, because JJ had met pretty much everyone in town, even the ones who brought tractors to school. And she had yet to meet any of her soulmates. 

A soccer scholarship was what finally got her into college, and almost more importantly, out of the town where she’d spent most of her life. If she didn’t tell someone about her soul marks, they didn’t know. Which is why JJ made damn sure that no one saw her marks in the locker rooms, or anywhere else. 

A little privacy was nice. And long overdue. 

JJ’s marks were right above her heart. Six sentences, lined up neatly under one another, neatly between her collar bones. No one really had any reason to catch a glimpse of them, especially with how careful JJ was. No low-cut tops, even though she thought a lot of them were very pretty. She always turned around if she changed with her roommate in the room, even though her roommate didn’t care enough to do the same. JJ didn’t mind. They lived together, there was no reason for her roommate to hide just because JJ didn’t want to be stared at anymore. 

Her sophomore year of college, Jennifer Jareau had decided that soul marks were pointless. Half the people she knew had met their soulmates. Most of the few people she knew who had two had already met at least one. The ones without marks seemed to be pairing off, too. It was simple. Perfect, almost. Too perfect for it to work out for JJ. 

Worse than not knowing her soulmate, though, was not knowing what she wanted to do with her life. Half her classmates were working on a major they loved with a person they loved by their side, and JJ was just... lost. She was away from home, finally had the freedom and privacy to do what she wanted... and she had no idea what she wanted to do. 

The campus bookstore became a bit of a safe haven. It wasn’t overly interesting, but it also wasn’t exactly crowded halfway through the semester. Hardly anyone had time for leisure reading, and no one needed new books for their classes. 

It was a place where JJ could just sit and think. 

It was the place where JJ picked up a book. She’d seen the author’s name on a couple of other books. Most people recognized the name David Rossi. She’d never read one of his books, though. She flipped to the copyright pages of all the books, found the earliest one, and started reading. Ten pages in, she bought the book, but didn’t leave the store.

The cashier handed the book back without a bag. She chuckled when JJ immediately opened the book again. 

—

Reading the first book led to a second, then a third. When she transferred to Georgetown, one of the first things she did was pick up Rossi’s latest book. She couldn’t help it; the man was a brilliant writer.   
Finding herself with a few hours to spare, JJ sat down in the bookstore, not unlike the one she’d started Rossi’s first book in two years prior. A woman, much like the cashier who had softly laughed at her (but JJ didn’t remember it being mean - just a chuckle of amusement.) tapped her shoulder. 

“Reading material for before the lecture?” she asked.

“Lecture?” 

The woman pointed to the book. “He’s giving a lecture next week. Are you going?” 

JJ nodded. “If I can.” 

She made a mental note to look into this lecture. If she had anything to say about it, she’d be in that audience. 

— 

Rossi’s lecture, JJ decided, was even more interesting than his books. The books were brilliantly worded and the content was more than just engaging, but there was something about listening to David Rossi speak and react to the audience that captured JJ’s attention even more completely. 

In that lecture hall, she caught the first glimpse of one of her soulmates. She found a window into the career path that she was becoming increasingly sure she wanted. in that lecture hall, she found the first moment on a path that would eventually lead her to her soulmates. Though she didn’t speak to Rossi directly for another few years, she continued to read his words, either blissfully or frustratingly unaware that his words were on her skin as well as between the pages of the books she had started to collect. 

A book signing, three years after she graduated, became her first meeting with David Rossi. It took her a moment to register the words that Rossi said, let alone the fact that they were one of her marks, and before she realized it, she was being ushered away from the line with a signed copy of Rossi’s first book (one she brought) and a signed copy of his most recent book (one she bought). 

She didn’t want to let the books out of her sight after that, even as she realized that, if they were soulmates, she would almost definitely meet him again. 

She wondered if that would be where she thought


	6. Prologue Part Six - Penelope

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Garcia is a snarky genius, but what else is new?
> 
> Warning for slight references to canon events in Garcia’s life, specifically what happened to her parents.

Penelope Garcia was a genius. 

She, unlike so many people she knew, didn’t feel the need to hide any of the six soul marks she had. She’d never been told that it was weird or wrong or anything else. From the time the marks appeared until she was eighteen years old, she didn’t feel any shame when she looked at her marks. They didn’t make her want to hide, they didn’t make her feel like she was different from everyone else. 

Her parents made absolutely sure that she never thought they’d be upset or ashamed of who her soulmates turned out to be, or how her relationships with them developed. Everything, and they meant everything was okay when it came to that. But they weren’t around forever. 

When she retreated into an online world, she stayed there for as long as she could. There, she didn’t have to admit that she felt responsible for what happened to her parents. There, she didn’t have to admit that she felt like a shield around her had shattered. She found herself hiding her marks, even from herself. Until she met them, those marks only served as a reminder of what she’d lost. 

It was in this online world that Penelope Garcia’s genius combined with her morals got her into trouble. 

It wasn’t like she was hacking anything important. She knew people who liked to cause chaos just to say they’d done it. In her experience, some of the worst security breaches came when the people with the skills to pull them off got bored. 

At least she had a reason for her attacks. It was clear to her that no one else was going to hold these people accountable for the things they did. Just because it wasn’t illegal didn’t mean it was right. And something being illegal didn’t mean it couldn’t be done. 

And the fact that Penelope Garcia had the skills to avoid getting caught didn’t stop her from leaving a trail that she knew could be followed. 

—  
Even if she’d meant to get caught, being handcuffed to a table was on Penelope Garcia’s top ten lists of things to never do again. And if she was lucky, she wouldn’t have to. 

For the first hour, Garcia wondered why no one was coming into the interrogation room. For the next, she allowed her mind to wander to a place she’d been trying to stop it from going for years. She let her gaze wander to her ankle, where the orange mark was. To the back of her knee, where she knew that if she adjusted her skirt, she’d find a green mark. To her hips, where she knew the silver and yellow marks were, one on each side. Right below her rib cage, where she remembered a red mark. And to the edge of her shoulder, where the dark blue sentence sat in an ever-so-inconvenient place - just outside of the area where so many of her dresses would have covered. Somehow she knew the person who matched that mark was someone who she’d always be a little intimidated by. 

That was fine. She doubted that any of her soulmates would be grating in the way Shane became. She doubted any of them would scare her in the same way she’d been scared her first ten minutes in this room. 

Finally, the door opened. There was no sign of any of the people who’d brought her to this room. She was relieved in a way - she wasn’t a fan of their methods. She was also a little scared because with the local police, at least she knew what to expect from them. To them, she was a criminal. 

To the man who walked through that door, she was an asset. 

“We’ve got you, Ms. Garcia.” 

_And the plot thickens._ She couldn’t help but think. 

“If you say so, suit.’ 

If Aaron Hotchner had been caught off guard by the fact this woman was his soulmate, he didn’t show it. He simply explained what her options were. When her witty retorts were cut short by another agent, he simply turned to her and said, “I need an answer now.” 

“Yes, if i can keep my purse.” 

She could’ve sworn she saw him smile at her when he said, “Good choice.”

He left the other agent to unlock her handcuffs. “Beauty and brains,” she shot at him.

He looked up, but didn’t reply. So he was going to make her try? Fine. 

“Hey eyebrows, when they do a men of the FBI calendar, is it just twelve months of you?” 

He gave her another look. “Welcome to the team.” 

Then he was gone, leaving Garcia with her purse and her thoughts. Two soulmates in one day? A day that she was handcuffed to a table, no less. She wasn’t sure what to expect from this team. If those two were a part of it, it was bound to be interesting. 

She wasn’t going to lie (to herself, anyway). This job sounded like exactly the kind of thing she wanted to use her skills for. Sure, hacking people who tested on animals was a noble enough cause, but she was tired of hiding. She was tired of feeling like a criminal for doing what she thought were good things. 

These people, her soulmates, seemed like the perfect solution to the problem she didn’t know she had. Maybe that was the point. This team, though she had yet to meet a few of them, seemed like the key to the life she wanted. To the person she wanted to be. 

Maybe that was why she got caught.


	7. Prologue Part Seven - David

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rossi has a talent for meeting soulmates at inconvenient times.

David Rossi had many talents. Writing, saving lives, and tanking marriages among them. 

He tried not to draw attention to the marks he had, not out of shame, but out of a simple desire for privacy. There wasn’t anyone he wanted to share it with, not even his wife. She never asked, he never told. If he had to guess, he figured she thought he didn’t have a mark, the same way she didn’t. 

The beginning of the BAU was something Rossi recognized as important from the first time he saw it. Jason Gideon was just as invested as he was, which was good, because it took all the hard work either of them had in them to get the unit started. 

He met his first soulmate while he worked a case in Seattle, which figured. Aaron Hotchner, from the beginning, proved to be someone Rossi wouldn’t dare underestimate. 

For years, the sentence “That would be me” came up in conversation around Rossi, and he looked around, expecting to find that his soulmate said the words. For some reason, though, Rossi almost never heard that sentence from someone first, and if he did, it wasn’t directed at him. Until a crime scene in the middle of Seattle, late at night, when Agent Hotchner said it.  
He could tell when he looked at Aaron that he knew exactly what was going on, but neither of them pressed the subject. It felt like an unspoken agreement already: the job comes first, then we’ll deal with whatever this is.

—  
His first divorce was messy, but not unexpected. He couldn’t be there for Carolyn in the way she needed him to be. He knew that she tried to understand it, but there wasn’t anything left to do about it. 

The divorce ended with two very happy lawyers, a moderately unhappy ex-couple, and a promise that almost counted as a divorce vow. 

The divorce also ended with a sense of relief. He’d never wanted to hurt Carolyn, and there wasn’t anything he could do to stop his job from getting in the way of his marriage. He learned that very quickly. 

When Aaron Hotchner finally joined the team, it felt like someone Rossi had missed for a long time was finally coming home. Part of him wondered if Aaron felt the same way, but there was another part of him that would never swallow his pride and ask. So he didn’t.

They worked together for years. Rossi learned about Aaron and Haley, drank scotch with Aaron when a case got to be too much, and they were there for each other. It was refreshing to have someone close to you understand exactly why you wanted nothing more than to go home and have a drink or two, because exhausted as you were, you didn’t want to sleep just yet. Not with the memories of whatever horror you had just faced still fresh in your mind. 

It was worse when you had to give up, though. Knowing what the monster had done and knowing there was nothing else you could do to help stop them. Those were the nights Rossi stopped by Aaron’s desk before he left, just to check in. 

Eventually, though, he needed it to stop. He needed to do something else with his time.

So he left the BAU. He wrote about anything he could think of until he settled into a single topic, the thing that would become his first book. Then, once he finished it, he kept writing. He went on book tours every so often, guest lectured, and wrote some more. Everyone seemed to want to read what he had to say. Everyone wanted to listen to him. Everyone wanted to know more. 

A book signing. An event that had become a staple in his existence of ever-increasing boredom. He sat there, behind the table, signing the books people brought with them, signing new copies of the book he was promoting. The line snaked through the store, and eventually, a young woman with blonde hair came to the table, holding two books. One appeared to have been read several times, and the other didn’t even have a crack in the spine: his first book and his latest. He opened the front cover of the older book and simply signed it. 

The woman seemed a bit shocked that she was actually standing in front of him. He’d seen that reaction plenty of times, but this seemed a little different for some reason. 

As he opened up the second book, he asked, “Have you read this one yet?” 

She seemed surprised by the question, then shook her head. “I’ve read all the others, but not this one.” 

After his first meeting with a soulmate, Rossi wasn’t exactly surprised by the location. It was, apparently, his luck that he found his soulmates when he was in the middle of something important. He signed it, then closed the cover. 

_So the yellow one is yours. - David Rossi_

He didn’t say anything else to her, hoping she would understand why. It wasn’t that he didn’t have time for her. It was just that a public book signing didn’t seem like the greatest place to have his first real conversation with a soulmate. The next few people in line had their books signed before Rossi was able to take his eyes off the woman. He didn’t even know her name. He recognized her from somewhere. Or maybe he was imagining things. 

Maybe she’d been to a signing before? If that were the case, why would she have brought the first book to this one? A lecture? If so, she hadn’t asked him any questions. It had to be their first exchange. The mark made him sure of that. 

He hoped they’d meet again soon, so he didn’t get into the habit of referring to her as his yellow soulmate, rather than her name.


	8. First Meetings

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Everyone meets, Rossi hatches a plan, and I have to add Elle and Gideon to the character tags. Enjoy!

Rossi and Aaron met first. The whole team knew about the Tommy Yates case (no one wanted to use the name Womb Raider.) They knew how that case was the one that led to Hotch joining the unit. Every year, Rossi went to the prison and came back with another name, and no matter how hard they tried, Rossi didn’t accept their offers to go with him. 

As a result, they didn’t celebrate Rossi’s birthday. They celebrated the day Aaron joined him on the team, because Rossi always told them that day felt like coming home in a way his birthday never would again. 

—  
JJ and Rossi were the second pair to meet. JJ still kept the books Rossi had signed for her that day, and Rossi found a sunflower on his desk once a year. A simple reminder, almost like JJ was reminding him that she remembered. 

Morgan and Hotch met the day Morgan joined the team. It wasn’t as excited as Hotch and Rossi’s story. It didn’t have the obvious significance that JJ’s did, but it was theirs. A day in the office made special because of the person they met that day. They worked well together, got along most of the time, and their arguments weren’t explosive the way Rossi remembered Hotch’s arguments with Haley. Maybe the special thing about them was that they didn’t need anything special. 

When Reid met the team, it was careful and shy and everything Reid himself was. Garcia’s entrance was bubbly and bright and matched her purple lines perfectly. They were two very different kinds of genius, but the team needed both of them. No one seemed to pay attention to Garcia’s past or to Reid’s struggle to get into the field. 

Gideon tried to ignore the fact that half his team were soulmates, but it was apparent in the way that the worked together. He’d never seen teammates work together so seamlessly so quickly. 

When Elle joined the team, they didn’t tell her, but she figured it out pretty quickly. When she and Reid made it off the train, Elle asked him, “So, which one of them is your soulmate?”  
Reid looked at her. The question had obviously caught him off guard, but he answered anyway. “Morgan.” 

“Don’t lie to me, Spencer.” 

“I’m not lying.” 

“Fine, tell me the whole truth, then.” 

“Morgan, Garcia, Hotch, and JJ.” Reid looked at his hands. 

Elle laughed. “Not Gideon?” 

“Not Gideon. He tries to ignore it, but you know how Morgan and Garcia are.” 

“That I do.” 

“Is it just the five of you?” 

“There are two more of us, but even Garcia can’t figure it out until we meet them.”

“Is that hard?” 

“Not any harder than waiting to meet one soulmate.” 

“Oh, well, I wouldn’t know.” Elle admitted, “I don’t have a mark.” 

When Reid didn’t answer, Elle let her attention shift to Gideon. “What do you think he’d do if I called him mom?” 

“Let me know before you do. So I can run.” 

— 

No one was happy that Elle left the team. Sure, Hotch had been suspicious of her, and he’d been concerned about her safety along with the rest of the team’s, but he wasn’t glad she was gone. They would all miss her, he knew that, but a part of him was more than a little relieved that it wasn’t one of his soulmates who’d done that.

He would’ve arrested her in a heartbeat if he had proof, but he didn’t. And he didn’t know how he would’ve reacted if one of his soulmates got into that situation. As far as he was concerned, not knowing was a better option by far. 

—  
When Hotch met Emily Prentiss for the first time, he was wary. Not because he doubted that she was a clever woman and a competent agent, but because he knew how eager new agents were to prove themselves in this unit. Really, any new agent would’ve made him nervous. It didn’t have anything to do with the fact that she was his sixth soulmate. Nothing at all. 

Aaron didn’t tell the rest of the team who their last soulmate was, even though he was pretty sure it was Rossi. He didn’t want to force the meeting. Besides, how was he supposed to bring that up with Dave? “Come meet my team. By the way, five of them are your soulmates.” 

Then again, Emily seemed to react well walking into a room full of her soulmates, so maybe Rossi wouldn’t be too shocked. 

When Hotch suggested Emily join Gideon and Reid at Guantanamo, he didn’t blame Gideon for hesitating, but he knew Prentiss would be useful. He didn’t tell Gideon that Emily was another soulmate, and he pulled Reid aside before they left. “Don’t tell Gideon about Emily. You know how he feels about that. “ 

“Yeah, I know.” 

Hotch made sure to remind the rest of the team of the same thing before Gideon, Prentiss, and Reid got back. It was not secret that Gideon wasn’t a fan of soulmates working together. He thought it clouded their judgement, even though Morgan and Hotch had both tried to convince him that it didn’t. Hotch didn’t really want to relive that conversation (not that it had been much of a conversation). 

“There’s no difference. They’re my team. Of course I want them to be safe, just like I want everyone else to be safe.” 

“Don’t kid yourself, Hotch.” 

He still tried to convince himself that he didn’t have any bias. Of course, he did, but between Gideon questioning him at every turn and Morgan’s quiet reminders, he managed to keep it from interfering with his job. It killed him a little every time he had to send one of his soulmates into a dangerous situation, but if he couldn’t trust them to keep each other safe, he couldn’t trust anyone. And he trusted his team with his life, the lives of victims, local law enforcement, even unsubs to a certain extent. 

If he could trust them with all of that, he could trust them to be smart and keep each other as safe as possible in dangerous situations. He and Dave had done it when they worked together, and he continued to do it with his team now, no matter what Gideon thought of it. 

— 

Hotch couldn’t pretend he wasn’t relieved when he heard Dave was coming back to the team. They’d kept in contact, though not as much as either one would’ve liked. It was easier to stay in touch when you had the same busy schedule. Hotch’s work hours combined with Rossi’s book-related obligations made it difficult to even find time for a phone call. 

As glad as he was that Rossi was coming back, Hotch still didn’t know how he was supposed to tell the team that he’d known who their last soulmate was all along, and he was even less eager to explain to Dave why he hadn’t told him that he was working with five of his soulmates and didn’t bother to tell him. 

— 

JJ knew. She still kept the books at her desk. Whatever Hotch’s reasons were for not telling the others, she didn’t ask about it. It made sense, in a way. If it had been her, she wouldn’t have wanted someone to force a meeting with one of her soulmates. 

So she didn’t push the subject. She didn’t even tell Hotch that she knew, she just kept the books on a shelf next to her desk and the memory that went with them to herself. 

It wasn’t like they weren’t going to find out eventually. That, and she kind of wanted to see the look on Spence’s face when he found out that one of his soulmates was David Rossi. 

Another good thing about Hotch not knowing was that no one would have to find out about JJ’s first meeting with Rossi unless she wanted them to. And she knew she would eventually... she just might let Hotch deal with the fallout first. 

— 

Rossi wanted to kill his soulmate. Actually, he wanted to kill two of them, though Aaron’s life was in more immediate danger than JJ’s was. Aaron had let him walk into what was, in his book, essentially a minefield of soulmates. And he knew JJ knew about it, because she had the nerve to bring his book into the bullpen. Not the latest one, of course. The one he’d put that inscription in. And it still didn’t have a crack in the spine. 

If JJ wanted to play that game, fine. He’d play along. 

“Have you read this one yet?” 

JJ looked down at the book and laughed. “I’ve read all the others, but not this one.” 

“Why’d you save that one for last?” 

“I just did. I don’t get a lot of time to read.”

He knew what she meant. It wasn’t like there was time for reading during cases, and they had a lot of them. Even if you lived alone, there was plenty of catching up to do when you got home from a case - reading wasn’t exactly a priority, especially not reading about serial killers. 

“If the job is anything like i remember, I can imagine.”

With that, Dave started towards Hotch’s office. JJ put a hand on his shoulder, then pulled it away, suddenly aware that half the bullpen was watching Rossi. 

“Don’t be too hard on him.” 

“I make no promises.”

Before he got the chance to knock, Aaron said, “Come in.” 

“I’m sure you know what I’m here about, Aaron.”

Aaron gave him a half smile before he said, “Sorry about that. I didn’t want to spoil it for them.” 

“You could’ve warned me.” 

“I wanted to see the look on your face.” 

“Did you tell... I still don’t know her name.” 

“I’m going to need a little more than that, Dave.” 

“Her mark is yellow.” 

JJ appeared in the doorway. “Agent Jareau. JJ to you. I’m the media liaison.” 

“Media liaison?” 

“I coordinate with local law enforcement, the press, and families, mostly. I also do a lot of paperwork that I’m sure you don’t want to hear about.” 

As she left, Rossi turned back to Aaron and said, “I met her at a book signing, years ago.” 

“And you didn’t bother mentioning that you’d met another soulmate?” 

“You didn’t bother mentioning five of them, Aaron. Speaking of which, you do realize all of our soulmates are on the same team now, right?” 

“The thought did occur to me. Gideon wasn’t happy when there were six of us.” 

“He wasn’t happy when there were two of us.” 

“He was actually considering talking to the section chief about it.” 

“Gideon? Willingly talking to Strauss? He must have been annoyed.” 

“You had to talk to Strauss about coming back here.” 

“Look, if you make me say out loud that I missed being here, I’m going to have to actually make good on the threats from earlier.” 

“What threats?” 

“I told JJ that I wasn’t going to go easy on you.” He paused. “Actually, I refused to promise not to be too hard on you.” 

“I think I can handle it, but it’ll have to wait. The rest of the team is waiting for us.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And so we have our first real chapter! I’m going to try and keep up a consistent update schedule, but school gets in the way sometimes and I have no self control, so if a chapter is a little early or a little late, it’s not a sign of the apocalypse, I promise! (I was supposed to post the prologue chapters at least a day apart and i posted 5-7 all on the same day...)


	9. Not Today

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A look at how six people react when the one soulmate that shouldn't be in danger is targeted (a rewrite of 3.09 Penelope).

The waiting room was hell. Not just because one of their team members was in surgery, but because it was the one person on their team that shouldn’t have been in this position. Ever. The one thing they could be sure of on cases was that Garcia was there and ready to help them.

JJ’s attempt to get an update was met with a brick wall. The first time, JJ assumed it was because they couldn’t tell anyone but family about Penelope’s condition. The second attempt, the one where she explained how five of Penelope’s six soulmates were in the waiting room, didn’t get her anywhere either, and JJ realized that it was because they didn’t have any solid information to give her.

Emily’s hand in hers was only a small comfort, a reminder that her soulmates were there and that she wasn’t going through this alone. Emily, for her part, wanted to physically fight anyone she could get her hands on until someone gave her some answers.

All they could do was wait – both for news about Garcia and for Morgan to show up.

He was in church, and when he left, his world fell apart. He’d barely walked out of the church when he felt a stabbing pain. He’d been shot before, and this felt nothing like that. It was over within a minute, but he knew that this was the pain his mother had attempted to describe to him, years earlier. The messages on his phone from JJ, Hotch, and Reid confirmed what he was feeling. Before he got to the hospital, his guess was that Garcia had been resuscitated. The pain that he’d felt hadn’t lasted long enough to be one of his soulmates dying, but one of them flatlining in an operating room?

When he arrived, everyone was in the waiting room. Everyone caught him up on what they knew before they got the update they’d all been desperately waiting for, and it confirmed what Morgan had guessed – they all knew what “touch and go” meant on an operating table.

\--

When Penelope made JJ promise not to talk about her like a victim, JJ could have sworn she felt the same stabbing pain in her heart that she did while Penelope was in surgery. She shouldn’t have had a reason to talk about Garcia like a victim, because Garcia was supposed to be the one that was safe.

\--

Reid could feel his heart break a little as Morgan explained his end of the situation they were in. He wanted, more than anything, for their family to be safe, for things to be less complex than they were, and for more than six other people to understand who they were and why they worked so well together. It felt wrong to see Morgan so emotionally vulnerable – he was the one they counted on to break down doors, to chase the men they hunted in a more literal sense than any of them. It felt like whatever tentative sense of normal they had while they worked this job had vanished, because Garcia was supposed to be the one who worried about whether her soulmates were going to come back safely, and Morgan was supposed to be the person who was in dangerous situations every other day.

\--

Rossi was more vocal about it than Hotch was – but they were both tired of being behind whoever had shot Garcia. The investigation managed to move forward, despite the brass interfering with the team. Rossi was right when he’d said that Hotch had been wishing that anyone else was leading the team. The last thing Aaron wanted to do was cooperate with Internal Affairs.

\--

Emily and JJ watched as their evidence board was taken away from them, and they both wanted to scream. One of their soulmates was in the hospital, and the Bureau wanted to investigate her? Emily knew that it was an awful idea, but she wanted to scream at the IA representative that they needed to help their soulmate.  
The FBI didn’t know that the seven of them were soulmates. If they’d known, Emily was sure they’d have all been reassigned before they had the chance to become the team they currently were. As angry as she was at Gideon’s total lack of explanation when he left, she had to be grateful that, despite his disapproval, Gideon had kept his mouth shut about his complaints. She had no idea how long it would have taken for her to meet any of her soulmates had the team not been allowed to stay together for the years Dave and Hotch worked together, or after any of her other soulmates joined the team.

Garcia might have been the only Bureau employee with the means to figure out who someone’s soulmate was, so it was a very good thing that she also had an interest in making sure that information never made it back to the brass. There was no database of soulmate pairs, no list of people who didn’t have exactly one soulmate. The closest thing anyone had was marriage licenses, where couples could indicate whether they were soulmates. The marriage licenses were also the best way to find out if someone had more than one soulmate, because the only way a person was permitted to marry more than one person was if they confirmed that they were soulmates.

\--

When Morgan realized that Battle was in the BAU, everyone in Garcia’s apartment felt the dread settle over them. He was prepared to shoot his way out of building that held three of their soulmates. Wasn’t having one of them in danger enough for one day? (Of course it wasn’t. They routinely ended up in situations where most of them were in danger.)  
When JJ picked up the phone, she wasn’t expecting Morgan to tell her that the man who’d shot Garcia was in the same building as her. When Hotch and Rossi saw her appear in the doorway to the bullpen, they both knew it was over. JJ didn’t miss.

When the glass was broken and Battle was covered with a sheet, everyone was left to sort through what they were feeling. JJ hadn’t lied when she told Garcia she hadn’t blinked. Garcia was her family – the one member that this shouldn’t have been able to happen to, and she didn’t hesitate to protect her. That was how JJ coped with it. She didn’t think about how she’d shot someone for the first time, she thought about how that shot had saved Hotch and Rossi, and allowed Garcia to feel safe again. That was the only way she could think about it.

\--

JJ offered Reid a ride home that night. Partly because she didn’t want to drive home with only the memories of the night, and partly because she always felt safer when one of her soulmates was by her side. Neither of these reasons, however, were enough to fool Reid.

“You want to ask me something, don’t you?”

JJ couldn’t look at him without taking her eyes off of the road, but she nodded. “How do you deal with it?”

“With what?”

“The… aftermath.”

They came to a stop outside Reid’s apartment, and JJ looked at him.

“Gideon told me that it was going to hit me. And it did, eventually. He also told me that I needed to know that a lot of good people were alive because of what I’d done. JJ, you saved half our team by shooting Battle.”

“But it doesn’t feel like that’s enough. I told Garcia that I didn’t blink, and I didn’t, but…”

“You’re blinking now.”

“Yeah.”

“We’re all here for you. Most of us have been there.”

JJ nodded. Reid went to get out of the car, but before he did, he said, “Emily might be able to help you more than I can. She says she compartmentalizes well. I’m guessing there’s more to that than she tells us.”

On the short drive from Spencer’s apartment to JJ’s house, JJ called Emily.

“Prentiss.”

Emily’s standard phone greeting felt a bit harsh, but JJ managed to say, “Hey,” before she felt the first tear hit her cheek.

“We don’t have a case this soon, do we? JJ? Is something wrong?”

Before she could stop herself, JJ was rambling. “I told Penelope I didn’t blink and now I’m blinking and Reid thought you could help and I really don’t know how I’m supposed to handle this?”

“Do you want me to come over?”

“No, Emily, you deserve a night off. We don’t get enough of those.”

“JJ. If you need me, I’m coming over.”

JJ took a deep breath, but it didn’t do anything to steady her. She was parked in front of her house without any memory of finishing the commute, and she felt herself crying, but didn’t actually feel like she was crying. “Okay.”

“I’ll be right there.”

When Emily turned off the ignition in front of JJ’s house, she could see JJ sitting in the window on the second floor. She called JJ’s cell to let her know she was there, and when JJ picked up, she immediately heard, “You have a key. Come on in.”

Emily dug in her purse for a moment before she found the small metal box. She put in a code, and the box sprang open. Inside, there were six keys, one for each of her teammates’ homes. Keeping them locked in the box was Emily’s way of keeping her soulmates safe. She knew Hotch kept his in his gun safe at home, and that Rossi kept his in a locked drawer at work. She pulled out the key labeled “Morgan” (she didn’t want to make it too easy for someone who got inside the box) and let herself in through JJ’s front door.

As she closed the front door behind her, JJ appeared at the top of the stairs. She’d clearly been crying, and Emily restrained herself just long enough to let JJ get to the bottom of the stairs before she all but ran forward to wrap her in a hug.

“What do you need, JJ?”

“Reid said you might be able to help…”

“With what?” As she asked, Emily thought she might already know the answer.

“I told Garcia that I didn’t blink when I shot Battle, and I didn’t then, but it’s starting to hit me.”

“It’s going to be hard sometimes. I won’t lie to you about that. But we’re all going to be here when it gets hard for you. Especially me.”

They were sitting in JJ’s living room now, in a chair that wasn’t really big enough to hold them both, but Emily didn’t mind. She just kept her arms wrapped around JJ, who was curled up in the chair, and leaning mostly against Emily.

“I just don’t know how to deal with it the way the rest of you do.”

“You’re going to learn. Even if you never have to do it again, you’ll learn how to deal with this. I did. Reid did. Hell, even Hotch and Dave had to at one point.”

They stayed like that until well past midnight, without saying another word. JJ eventually drifted off, and with an impressive maneuver on Emily’s part, ended up sitting in the chair, alone, and wrapped in a blanket. Emily stayed awake most of the night, keeping an eye on JJ and figuring out if there was anything in JJ’s kitchen that they could have for breakfast. Around the time JJ started to come back to reality, Emily had settled on making some eggs, since JJ apparently hadn’t been shopping for a while.

JJ walked into the kitchen and asked, “Did you sleep at all?”

“Not really. I made some breakfast.”

“Emily…”

Emily interrupted, “Before you say I didn’t have to, I wanted to. I promise. Coffee or tea?”

“Tea. I can get it.”

“Or you can sit back and let me take care of you for a little while.”

JJ couldn’t think of any other arguments, nor did she really want to. So she sat in one of the chairs at the counter and let Emily make tea for both of them, and when Emily sat down next to her, she went to grab her hand, then realized what she was doing and started to pull back. Before she could, Emily caught JJ’s hand and said, “I might need it back in a minute, but I’m okay with it if you are.”

“I’m more than okay with it.”


	10. We're All Damaged

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is based on season 3, episode 14 "Damaged", so I'd recommend re-watching that episode if you want more context.

While JJ and Penelope were discussing Rossi’s not so welcome visit to Garcia’s apartment, Emily was becoming increasingly concerned. Rossi never left his office in disarray like this. She hadn’t known him for long, but she knew something was wrong. When JJ and Garcia emerged, she was staring at the pile of papers and files in the middle of the floor. Garcia quickly returned to her office, clearly embarrassed about something, and JJ drifted over to where Emily was still staring at Rossi’s office from the hallway. 

“What happened here?” 

“I don’t know, but Garcia might.” 

The one advantage that Morgan, Prentiss and JJ had over Rossi while they tried to figure out what was going on was that all of them had been working with Penelope Garcia for over a year, and they knew exactly how to get her to tell them what was going on. It helped, though, when Emily played the soulmate card. 

“He might need our help. And if he doesn’t, having some support from us couldn’t hurt.” 

“But what if it does?” 

“Have any of your soulmates ever done any damage by supporting you?” 

“…no.” 

And just like that, the rest of Garcia’s family was on a plane. With Hotch and Reid in Connecticut, it didn’t feel like a normal case, but with none of her soulmates around the office for her to talk to, it felt exactly like a normal case. The only difference was that two of her soulmates were all but unreachable in a prison, and another one of them was upset at best, unstable at worst. 

It wasn’t a normal case at all, but Garcia missed her family already. JJ, Hotch, and Rossi’s offices all sat empty, waiting for their owners to return to them with a stack of files that made Garcia cringe (paper files were never her forte). At least on a normal case, she’d be able to reach all her soulmates at once. 

\--

When Rossi saw three of his teammates in the hotel lobby, he cursed internally. He’d known they were coming, but he still didn’t want to explain himself to them. It wasn’t a BAU case, yet he’d tracked down Garcia in the middle of the night, bought a house, and come back to the bureau just to finish what hadn’t had the opportunity to twenty years ago.   
All Rossi could say to them, after they’d shot down all his excuses was, “Why do you care?”

“Because you do. We’re a team.”

“And this isn’t a case that the team is working on.” 

“Need I remind you that we all have words that you said etched into our skin in this ugly-ass shade of orange? We want to help you. This had nothing to do with our jobs,” Morgan shot back. 

“If it needs to be a BAU case, it’ll be a BAU case,” JJ added. 

It felt odd, once the case was closed. He still had the bracelet, but it stayed tucked away. He didn’t keep it with him anymore, and though he knew the dreams would never completely go away, it was comforting to know that he’d given the kids the closure and opportunity to move on and get a fresh start. 

\--

If seeing Chester Hardwick out of his chains unsettled Reid, seeing Aaron Hotchner take off his suit jacket downright terrified him. In the four years Reid had known him, he’d never witnessed Hotch lose his temper with anyone, whether it be an unsub, a witness, or a particularly grating local police officer. Yet here they were, essentially trapped in a room with a man who had killed more than twenty people, and Aaron Hotchner was losing his temper. Hardwick was either agitated or excited, possibly both, and neither of these scenarios made Reid feel very secure. 

After what felt like the longest thirteen minutes of Reid’s life, the door opened and Hotch immediately regained his composure. For a split second, Reid had seen Hotch truly angry, and suddenly, he was back to the Unit Chief he and the rest of his team knew. 

The car ride back felt strained, with the discussion of Hotch’s divorce and his apology to Reid, but it felt like it needed to happen, like Reid had gained something valuable about who Hotch was. It had never really hit him, not until then, just how little he knew about Aaron Hotchner. 

\--

The team gathered in the conference room, as they normally did at the beginning of cases, but this time, they were at the end of a case. It wasn’t the way they normally did things, but their cases didn’t normally last twenty years and only involve half their team. Rossi was the first to speak. 

“First, I wanted to thank you all for helping me with this case. It was never your job, but you did it anyway.”

“We were more than happy to do it, Rossi.” Emily said. 

Morgan added, “I’m sure you’ve heard Garcia say it at least once by now – we’re a family.” 

“Even if you wanted to get rid of us, it would be extremely unlikely for the seven of us to stay apart for long,” Reid said, “Soulmates, especially soulmate groups, tend to react poorly to being separated from each other for long periods of time.” 

Rossi thought about that for a moment. He and Aaron had gone nearly three years without seeing each other before he came back to the bureau, and he’d spent most of that time writing about the very thing that he’d been trying to escape by retiring. He had to admit, Reid’s facts seemed to have some merit here. 

“Let me thank you all in peace, or I’ll retire for good.” 

He could’ve sworn he saw Aaron roll his eyes. “Secondly, I wanted to invite you all to my house for dinner. I promise I won’t keep you too late.”

“I’m in, as long as Rossi’s providing the drinks,” Emily said. 

“Now, what kind of host would I be if I didn’t have alcohol for you?” 

Everyone started to get up and head towards the elevator, throwing witty remarks at each other as they made their way to their respective cars (“Hey Pretty Boy, why don’t you ride with me? The Metro is a nightmare this time of night,” Morgan said.)

\--

When the seven of them were settled around a different round table, Rossi said, “Now I didn’t just invite you here so you could get drunk.” He eyed Emily, who set down her wine glass and put up her hands in surrender. 

“Listening, not drinking, I swear.” 

“Sure you are, Emily,” Derek grinned at her, and set down his own glass. “Rossi, you were saying?”

“You all know as well as I do that this job can take a lot out of a person. We’ve all seen things worse than that case in Indianapolis. But we all have cases that get to us. They aren’t necessarily the worst ones, or the ones with the highest body counts. But they are the ones that keep us awake at night.” 

“Where are you headed with this, Dave?” Aaron asked. 

“If you all agree, I’d like to get together, outside of work, once a week or so. Just so we can talk through the cases that we don’t want to bring home to the other people in our lives. We’re the ones who know what these cases do to a person better than anyone else.”

Garcia was the first one to speak. “All of them get to me.” 

Morgan put his hand on her shoulder. “I’d be worried about you if they didn’t get to you. Are you in?”

“Yeah, okay.” 

“Then I’m in.” 

JJ looked at Rossi. “I’m in.” 

Reid looked over to JJ, then at Morgan. “I don’t have anywhere better to be.”

Hotch smiled, just long enough for the rest of the team to catch it. “I think it’s a great idea, Dave.” 

Everyone laughed a little when Emily said, “If I say I’m in, can I drink my wine?” 

“Yes, Prentiss, you can drink your wine. And Morgan, don’t think I didn’t see you sneaking a drink earlier.” 

The first dinner turned out to be a success. Rossi didn’t talk much, but the rest of the team shared stories about some of their toughest cases. Hotch mentioned the case he’d met Rossi on. Morgan talked about the victims of one case, but not about the investigation. Garcia spoke more generally, about her teammates being in danger and how she felt safe in her office, but not safe enough because her soulmates were all out there and in danger. JJ talked about Tobias Hankel, after Reid gave her a look that said it was okay – they all knew what he’d been through except Rossi, and he didn’t really feel like talking about it. Emily, like Garcia, spoke generally, about how difficult it was dealing with families. “I didn’t realize what that was like until I joined this team. I can’t imagine being on the other end of that.” 

When the conversation died down again, Reid spoke. “When I shot Phillip Dowd, Gideon told me it would hit me. It didn’t really get there for about a week. I looked down at my gun, and I remembered what I’d done to earn it. And suddenly earn didn’t feel like the right word.” 

He looked down at his plate. “It didn’t feel right to have earned something by taking someone else’s life. Even if it was an unsub who was trying to kill me.”

When they all made it back to their respective houses, none of them could remember sleeping quite as well at the close of a case. And the next Wednesday night, they did the same thing, this time at a diner in the middle of nowhere. They had a plane to catch, but none of them wanted to be awake on the flight home, and they had an hour before they needed to leave, so they took the hour to talk through a few of the things that had bothered them about the case. 

No one said anything, but suddenly, Morgan never had plans on Wednesday nights. One by one, Wednesday night dinners became an expected part of their schedules, something that everyone around them needed to understand. Kevin and Garcia never went on Wednesday night dates, at least not for dinner. Once, Kevin took her to an early movie and dropped her off at Rossi’s house without being asked. 

There was very little that could be normal about their lives, and although the reasons behind their Wednesday nights were far from normal, sitting there, together, felt like the most normal thing any of them had ever done.


	11. We Value It

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Reid makes risky decisions. His soulmates all deal with it a little differently  
> (Beginning is based on the end of "Elephant's Memory", the rest is set directly after)

                Hotch’s lecture on the plane back to D.C. almost wasn’t as painful as the almost-lectures Reid had been getting through the glances and short sentences Hotch threw at him during the entire Owen Savage case. Almost. Hearing someone come out and say that he’d endangered the lives of his soulmates (and in the process, the entire unit, because everyone knew that losing one of them would break the rest) made Reid want to cry, or scream, or both. All he’d wanted was for things to turn out okay just once. One single time, and when he got it, he also got a lecture that made it impossible to properly celebrate it with anyone. Wednesday couldn’t arrive quickly enough.

                Even if he wasn’t going to talk about it, Reid knew that spending some time with his family (really, that was what they were, not a team, but a family) would make him feel better, at least for a little while. Wednesday nights were the times that they were able to stop being a team (efficient, effective, and somewhat secretive) to being a family, where they would openly acknowledge, though only to each other, that they were soulmates, and they could behave like the family that they were, not the team that everyone in the office (and any of the many field offices and precincts that their work brought them to) expected them to be.

                Before he got to Wednesday, though, he had to get through the rest of the night. This night happened to contain Penelope Garcia, who had no doubt heard about what he’d done, either through Morgan or some other means that only Garcia knew about. And before he met Garcia at the doors to the BAU, Reid had to deal with three of his other soulmates pulling him aside and asking him questions that he was in no state to answer. Rossi, for his part, seemed to understand that Reid needed some time to process what was going on, and for that, Reid was grateful. He wasn’t sure he could have handled Rossi’s “disappointed mentor” persona right then.

\--

                JJ was the first to ask him if he was okay. She sat down next to him after he moved away from the small table where Hotch was still reading over the case file, and quietly asked, “How are you doing?”

                Reid was somewhat surprised that she hadn’t gone straight into lecture mode, but at the same time wasn’t surprised at all. JJ knew, more than anyone else, what it was like to be the one that everyone saw as – not fragile, he wouldn’t be on the team if he was fragile – but less experienced, almost, like he wasn’t as well equipped to deal with everything that the job threw at them, mentally.

                When he didn’t answer, JJ didn’t push him, she simply shifted to the other side of the table where Emily was sitting, with her head against the window. They weren’t obvious about it, but it was hard for a plane full of profilers not to notice when Emily subconsciously reached for JJ’s hand.

\--

                When Morgan asked him, it was with none of the fire that he was expected  - maybe Morgan realized what Reid was already going to get from Garcia, but all he said was, “I’m here for you, kid.”

                When Emily asked (as they walked back into the building), she did it indirectly. Even so, Reid knew exactly what she was trying to say with her offer.

                “Remember, I know how much coffee to add to your sugar.” = “Let me know if you want to talk.”

                Hotch didn’t say anything else to him that night. Reid figured that threatening to fire him once was enough for Hotch, but Reid didn’t see him desperately attempting to fill out the paperwork for the case without crying (not because he didn’t want to cry, because he did, but because tears on paperwork was the height of unprofessionalism.)

                Reid found himself hoping that Garcia either hadn’t heard (unlikely) or had already gone home (Reid didn’t bother calculating the odds, they were so slim.). Of course, she’d been waiting in her office during the flight, despite not having much to do besides some simple tasks that the Bureau would usually assign to other analysts. No one but her thought about it enough to figure it out, but Garcia had been desperately trying to calm herself down enough to talk to Reid, failing for the most part.

                Garcia’s indication that they’d arrived back at the BAU was JJ gently knocking on her door, armed with a cup of tea. “I know you want to talk to him right away, but drink this first?”

                Garcia nodded and pointed at the second chair (the one Kevin sometimes sat in if the team needed a second analyst helping them). “Sit. If you’re keeping me away from Reid, you better have a damn good distraction.”

                “Emily and I finally came to our senses.”

                Penelope set down her mug. “When you say, ‘Came to our senses’, you mean what exactly?”

                JJ shrugged and smiled a bit. “The rest of the team saw us holding hands on the plane, so I figured it would only be fair to put you on an even playing field.”

                “They saw you holding hands?”

                “We weren’t exactly trying to hide it. At the very least, Reid saw, because he congratulated me on our way in here.”

                At the mention of Reid, Garica picked up her tea again and started to drink it a little more quickly than she should’ve.

                “Slow down, Penelope. I asked him to stick around for a few minutes. He knows you want to talk to him.”

                “And that isn’t a reason for him to run screaming out of the building?”

                “I don’t know, is it? I never want to run away from you. But he’s had a long night. Everyone is at least a little worried about him. You could go easy on him, you know.”

                “I’ll try. It’s just that I have to sit here and wait for news, or for you to need something from me, and I never know if all of you are going to make it back to me.”

                “Did Morgan tell you about what we all felt after you got shot?”

                “Yes, but he didn’t describe it. I definitely don’t want to know what the physical sensation of one of you dying is, though, so please don’t tell me.”

                “I wasn’t planning on it.”

                Penelope put her empty mug down on her desk and went to get up. “Where is he?”

                “Last I saw him, he was finishing up some paperwork.”

                “Okay. Thanks for the tea, JJ.”

                “Any time, Penelope. And please, leave him with half a chance of getting to sleep tonight.”

                Garcia was out the door before JJ could finish her sentence.

                She found Reid sitting at his desk, right where JJ had said he would be. Morgan had told her everyone was okay before the plane even took off, but seeing Reid in person for the first time since the incident still flooded her with relief. He was safe, at his desk, exactly where he was supposed to be. Even if he had been in a standoff with a teenager with an assault rifle less than twelve hours prior.

                “Hey, Reid.”

                He looked exhausted. She doubted he’d actually been doing paperwork – it seemed more likely that he’d been preparing himself for whatever she was about to say to him.

                “JJ said you wanted to talk to me?”

                “Yeah. Morgan told me about what you did.”

                “What doesn’t he tell you?” Reid tried to keep the sarcasm back, but wasn’t completely successful. Garcia tried to hide the fact that it stung, but she wasn’t completely successful, either.

                “I just wanted to see you in person before you went home. I know I’d know way before I saw you if you weren’t okay, but I just… had to be sure.”

                “I’m guessing that’s not it, though.”

                She blurted it out before she could stop herself. “You do realize your life is worth a lot, right? Like, more than my sparkly words could even begin to describe.” When Reid didn’t answer, she continued.

                “When I got shot, everyone was so worried about me, and I get why, but you guys don’t always realize that that’s how I feel every time you all go into the field. It’s hard to just wait in my lair for Morgan to call me.”

                “I’m sorry.”

                “No, no, Reid, you don’t have to be sorry. It’s part of the job. I just wish you valued your life as much as the rest of us do.”

                “I do value it.”

                “I don’t think you do, at least, not as much as you should. That’s okay though, at least for now. We value it, and I’m sure we’ll rub off on you soon enough.”

                “Is that it?”

                “That’s it.”

                Reid managed a small smile. “And here I was thinking you were going to force me to drink a whole pot of coffee and spill my soul to you.”

                “I don’t need to force you. I just need to wait for Wednesday. You’ll do it on your own.”

\--

                As it turned out, with Wednesday came a new case, so Penelope didn’t get the chance to follow through with her almost-threat. Not in person, anyway. They spent the first Wednesday night of the case on a plane, so they settled for convening in the hotel lobby for a few stolen minutes before everyone had to retreat to their rooms. No one got around to much soul-baring, but it was far better than nothing. A Wednesday night that consisted of nothing was never going to be enough for any of them ever again. The second Wednesday of the case, they found themselves at a restaurant recommended by a few of the locals, with Garcia cheerfully contributing through the laptop at the end of the table.

                Fortunately, the third Wednesday of the case never came to be. The case broke early Friday evening, and the team was on their way back to D.C. before noon on Saturday. Their first proper dinner in three weeks was celebrated with a fancier than usual meal, courtesy of Rossi, and several delicious-looking desserts, courtesy of Garcia.

                No one really liked their makeshift dinners while they were on cases, but the idea of skipping a week was all but impossible for any of them. Even on the few occasions that they couldn’t leave a field office to have dinner, they ate together, and tried to avoid talking about the current case for a few minutes. They included Garcia as often as they could, which was easier on the days that they didn’t get the opportunity to go out.

                The ideal, though, was still a Wednesday night spent in Rossi’s dining room, with Emily being scolded for drinking too soon, or Penelope laughing at something Morgan said (and everyone being able to hear it perfectly clearly). These were, and probably always would be, the best Wednesday nights any of the team had ever had.


	12. There's Enough Space

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rossi always has the best ideas when it comes to the team  
> or  
> a glimpse into the living arrangements of a team who also happen to be soulmates

                Rossi’s house had become something of a home base for the team. Of course, the BAU would always be where they worked together and the round table room would always be where their cases began. The BAU was central to how they worked as a team, but as soulmates, Rossi’s house was becoming increasingly important to all of them. They all met there for dinner Wednesday nights (and some other nights, when a case forced them to have their dinner at a local diner or in a precinct conference room).

                Even when the whole team wasn’t there for dinner, it wasn’t rare for Hotch or Emily to be around for drinks at the close of a case, or for Garcia to come by to get Rossi’s opinion on something she’d made (always vegetarian to begin with – she didn’t want to know what Rossi’s reaction to tofu would be.) It became less of a scheduled thing, even for dinner, to the point that when the team went directly from the plane to Rossi’s dining room one Thursday evening, Rossi brought up the idea of the team staying with him.

                “Not all the time – I know we all have lives, but if you’re all interested, you could have a room for yourself set up here. I don’t mind, I have the space, and you all have keys to my house already. It would make it easier to deal with Emily when she gets her hands on my scotch.”

                “Hey! I’m not that hard to deal with?”

                Morgan bit back a laugh. “Yeah, because you can remember being blackout drunk so clearly.”

                Emily looked to JJ for backup, but all she got was, “I’m not going to lie, it is pretty entertaining.”

                Hotch brought the subject back around to Rossi’s statement. “I wouldn’t be opposed to it. We spend quite a bit of time here, and Emily aside, I’m not always in a position to drive after I’ve gotten ahold of your scotch.”

                Garcia’s first concern was whether Rossi would really be okay with having so many people staying with him. Rossi’s response was a dry laugh and, “Even if all of you stayed with me at once, the house is big enough to get away from all of you if I need to.”

                “Then I’m in. It’s not like we’re agreeing to move in full-time or anything.”

                “Emily? What do you think?” JJ asked.

                “I wouldn’t mind. Believe it or not, I like spending time with my soulmates.”

                “I do too. Morgan?”

                “Yeah, okay.”

                They all looked at Reid, and he nodded. “It’ll be nice to have somewhere other than an empty apartment.”

                “I’ll second that,” Garcia said.

\--

                Over the next few weeks, most of the team started to get their guest rooms (though that didn’t seem like exactly the right word) set up. Cases cropped up and got in the way of Garcia’s decorating (of both hers and Morgan’s rooms, despite some token protests from Morgan).

                Reid, for the most part, was content to leave his room how it had been furnished when they first decided on the arrangement, though he did add a bookshelf to fill with some of his favorite books. As he settled in to the idea of staying in the same house as his soulmates, he started staying at Rossi’s more often. He didn’t usually stay after cases, instead preferring to go back to his apartment and decompress alone, but about half of his nights were spent in a bedroom that was beginning to feel more like his than his own room. Garcia’s decorating enthusiasm spread into Reid’s room a bit. Some small decorations and a few extra blankets appearing one night appeared to be enough for Penelope.

                Morgan’s room, on the other hand, was a different story. Garcia had decorated it, but it felt like Morgan had done it himself. The furniture was simple, but functional. Of course, Garcia hadn’t been able to resist adding her own personal touch to it. A desk against one wall was set up similarly to his desk in the bullpen, but without a case file in sight. For the most part, Morgan only stayed over on Wednesday nights, though he occasionally spent the night at Rossi’s when he thought Reid or Garcia might need some support after a case.

                When Haley left, Hotch found himself all but unable to come back to his own house. His new apartment wasn’t a home. He couldn’t bring himself to create an environment that felt like a home when Jack wasn’t there. So, when he finally got his room set up, he stayed there any night that Jack wasn’t at his apartment. Really, one room was all Aaron needed when Jack wasn’t around, and the closer that room was to his soulmates, the better. Dave understood what he was going through more than anyone else in his life, even if he’d never been through a custody battle.

                Every night Aaron was there, Dave was also there to share a drink and talk, like a less structured version of their dinners with the rest of their soulmates. Aaron’s room was an extension of himself, of the person he was when he wasn’t allowed to be a father. It was organized, functional, nothing that was anywhere near playful or humorous. He kept go bags at both his apartment and at Rossi’s house, and this room felt more like a home to him than his apartment, because really, the only time his apartment felt like home was when Jack was there (and he knew that had nothing to do with the apartment.)

                Garcia’s room was colorful and playful and everything that she was. Despite the lack of violent images in this room, to the rest of the team it seemed very much like her office at work. She stayed at her own apartment occasionally. For the most part, if JJ or Emily were around, she stayed at Rossi’s for the extra chance to hang out with them. If Morgan was there, he was likely there to give support to either her or Reid, so she stayed almost every night Morgan did.

                If Reid was at Rossi’s house, so was Penelope. More times than she could count, she and Reid sat on the small couch in her room and watched some obscure movie or television show that the rest of the team didn’t appreciate in the same way they did. Sometimes, Reid preferred to read, which was fine by Penelope, who was more than willing to sit and knit in her room, which was next door to Reid’s, in case he needed anything. It took weeks before Penelope felt like she could leave him to his thoughts without worrying about him, but they managed.

                JJ kept her room simple, with only her bed, a desk, and a simple chair. Sometimes, she’d let herself into Rossi’s house in the middle of the night because she couldn’t sleep, or she’d stay there with the intention of staying up. It was more comfortable to give in to her fears (or her nightmares) when there were people nearby who understood why they were happening and what they could do to help her with them. She loved that she had somewhere simple and straightforward to come back to when her mind was anything but.

                She and Emily tended to stay apart when they were at Rossi’s, instead choosing to spend time together at JJ’s house or Emily’s apartment, because Rossi’s house was a hub for all of their soulmates, whereas in their homes, it was just them. If going to Rossi’s house wasn’t enough for JJ, she called Emily, and in turn, Emily called her. Even if it was just to share a cup of tea or a few tears, being together made them stronger.

                Emily’s room was decorated much like her apartment was, with a modern, simple theme. She had a desk in one corner, and she had one rule: she never, under any circumstances, brought her work with her to that desk. If something had to be done after work hours, she would stay late at her desk in the bullpen or she would bring the work to the desk that still sat, ready and waiting, at her old apartment. She was determined to keep her room at Rossi’s house free of the nightmares she dealt with, because it had been so long since she’d truly had a place where she felt safe. In a house full of her soulmates, she felt safe, and she was determined to not ruin that. The only indication of her work was the safe that she kept in the closet; not something she wanted, but something that was necessary.

                She stayed at Rossi’s house when she needed to feel something real. If something reminded her of her time before she joined the Bureau, or if she felt too much like a bored socialite in her meticulously organized apartment. If she needed a reminder that there were people she could trust and things that were safe, that room was where she went. Either there, or to JJ’s house. Her apartment just couldn’t be that place for her, and she was incredibly grateful that somewhere could be.

                Of course, Rossi spent every night they weren’t on a case in his own home. Just as he’d promised Penelope, he had his ways of avoiding his soulmates if he ever needed to be alone. To be fair, it was rare for more than three of them to stay at the house on any night except Wednesday (when it was just easier to stay with him, rather than get themselves home after dinners that sometimes lasted later than midnight). It was nice to have someone else around the house – it was really too big to live in it alone, but the ring of “I don’t have a house, I have a mansion,” was too good for Rossi (being overdramatic as he was) to pass up.

                The rest of the team sometimes wondered why it was always Rossi that came up with the good ideas when it came to the team. The real answer to that could be found in the fact that Rossi was far more committed to his team than he’d been to any of his marriages.


	13. High Risk, Minimal Loss

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I chose to write this chapter because I started thinking about how the minimal loss scenario would be different if the team had a definitive way of knowing whether Prentiss and Reid were still alive.

                The news coverage caught everyone in the office off guard, but JJ was in shock. Her best friend and her girlfriend were trapped in the ranch, and all she could do was look at the T.V. in horror and desperately hope that she wouldn’t be feeling the full force of the pain she’d only been briefly acquainted with anytime soon. She and Penelope stared at the television for a moment, and while Garcia snapped out of her trance when Morgan yelled for Hotch, JJ stayed glued to the screen until the ringing phones throughout the BAU told her that she had a job to do, and that doing it might save her soulmates.

                Between the fear and rage JJ was feeling, there was relief at the fact that she hadn’t felt any pain, which meant that Reid and Prentiss were at the very least alive, for now. Neither she nor any of her other soulmates knew anything else about their condition, but it was something.

                When Aaron and Dave heard the news, they were in action before they had time to blink, or to think about what was almost certainly happening to their soulmates. They didn’t have time to consider the implications of Prentiss and Reid’s situation, only that they were alive and that the team’s sole focus would be on getting them and as many other people as possible out of that ranch safely.

                Everyone on the team knew the procedure for a minimal loss scenario, and Aaron couldn’t help but be a little bit relieved that the only person who knew the statistics by heart wasn’t with them (and then he immediately felt a rush of shame for thinking it.)

                The attitude on the jet was one of grim determination. JJ appeared to be back to the sympathetic, calm media liaison that people around the country had come to know her as. To everyone except her team, she was the image of pure professionalism, miraculously unbothered by the terrifying situation playing out inside the ranch. She shut her concerns about Reid and Prentiss as far away as she could manage, focusing instead on the rest of the people trapped with Cyrus. They needed her help, too. If anyone could get them (and Reid and Prentiss) out of the ranch safely, it was this team. JJ had seen the team at its best, and they were efficient and skilled, even when the stakes were as high as they were. JJ needed to hold onto that until Reid and Emily were with them, safe on the jet back to the BAU with them.

\--

                Dave watched Aaron snap at the attorney general and immediately realized that this case was going to be even more difficult than he thought. If Aaron was already calling the ranch “his crime scene,” then he was already taking personal responsibility for every person inside the ranch and would be pinning the blame on himself for every person he’d be unable to save. If Prentiss or Reid were among them, Aaron would shatter, and there was a very good chance that the BAU would shatter with him.

                Later, when Dave explained this to Aaron over a drink, all he’d get would be a raised eyebrow and a flash of light behind Aaron’s eyes when he’d say, “All of that from ‘Get off my crime scene’? I thought we agreed not to profile each other.”

                Dave’s reply would be a snarky, “Too late.”

                For now, though, Rossi got to deal with being the lead negotiator in a case where neither he nor the lead agent on the case could have been any less emotionally involved in the case. He tried pointing this out to Aaron, but Aaron seemed to think that Dave was still the best person for the job, and Dave couldn’t find any flaws in Aaron’s logic, so he went with his decision.

                As concerned as Dave was about Aaron, he was doubly concerned about JJ. As one of three people who were currently able to see through her mask (not counting Garcia, Reid, or Prentiss, who were in the wrong location to witness it), Rossi knew that she wasn’t handling this well. He knew that none of them could be, with Prentiss and Reid being in so much danger, but JJ seemed to be faring the worst. He didn’t blame her – half of her life was inside that building.

\--

                Inside the ranch, Emily and Spencer had managed to keep themselves out of too much trouble. They subtly tried to keep the followers safe from the conflict, but there wasn’t much they could do without being stopped by one of the diehards. For the most part, though, all they could do was watch.

\--

                For JJ, controlling the press was becoming a desperate endeavor. In the years she’d been a liaison, she had absolutely learned that the press, at best, had a very different agenda than the police. Their main concern was the story – being the first to bring the news to the people (though JJ hadn’t been convinced that the press acted for the people’s right to know in a long time). At worst, the press was outright critical of the work the police were doing and attempted to do their job better than they did.

                Despite these reporters being some of the first type, they were able to do a lot of damage in a very short amount of time. One sentence, actually, said on the wrong news network, was enough to put a lot of people in a lot of danger. And JJ had to oh-so-pleasant job of trying to get the press to hold a story. It shouldn’t have been a surprise to her when he job turned from prevention to damage control, but it was.

She couldn’t have failed at her job when Emily and Reid’s lives were on the line. She couldn’t have. It wasn’t possible.

\--

                Cyrus was pissed, and he wanted answers.

                This was evident to both Reid and Prentiss as soon as Cyrus entered the small room where they were being kept. It was also evident to Emily that whoever admitted to being FBI was going to face punishment that was nowhere near divine, but she had no doubt that whatever Cyrus had in store for them was going to feel damn near like the wrath of God when it was happening. Less than thirty seconds after she came to this conclusion, she admitted to being the agent. Agent, singular, because there was no way she was letting Reid pay for the press’ mistakes. At least, she assumed that was how Cyrus found out; it usually was.

                As Emily was taken away from Reid’s sight, he gave her a look that Cyrus would read as confusion and betrayal, but that Emily recognized as an apology. She tried to tell him that it was okay, that it was her choice, but one of the diehards shut the door between them before she could gauge whether her message had been received.

\--

                Listening to what was happening inside the ranch was becoming more difficult for Hotch by the minute. He knew at this point that Reid and Prentiss had been separated and that Prentiss was being punished by the media’s complete lack of subtlety. Every minute that Cyrus spent with Emily was another minute that Hotch was wishing he could walk into the ranch and shoot Cyrus himself.

                Morgan and Rossi clearly weren’t having any easier a time listening to what was happening, but Rossi was thinking far more clearly than Hotch or Morgan was. Somehow, he managed to be a voice of reason, and as JJ watched the three of them, she wondered how any of them had survived without each other.

                Especially Hotch. How on Earth had Hotch managed to survive his time on SWAT without David Rossi there to keep him in check? Maybe the answer was in the fact that while he was on SWAT, he wasn’t responsible for the lives of five soulmates at the same time. JJ chuckled a bit at that; the idea that they were the solution to the problem they created.

\--

                When Dave looked to the ranch, knowing what was coming, he didn’t have words to describe the way it felt. Time was moving too quickly, but at the same time, it was moving excruciatingly slowly. Every minute that Prentiss and Reid were inside was another minute something could go horribly wrong, but every minute that passed on the way to 3 o’clock made it that much more likely.

                When Aaron told Dave that he couldn’t be a part of the raid, they both knew what Dave was going to say.

                “I’m going.”

                “If something happened to Prentiss or Reid, I.. I don’t know.”

                “You’re not alone.”

                And Rossi was right. Every member of their team left on the outside of the ranch knew exactly how Aaron was feeling, even if they didn’t feel it quite as intensely (since they didn’t have the added professional responsibility Aaron did). If anything happened to Emily or Spencer inside the ranch, during the raid or otherwise, none of them would be the same. All of them somehow understood that if they lost one soulmate, the team would fall apart. 

                When Emily heard the explosion behind her, her heart stopped for a moment. Part of her expected to feel that horrible pain again, and a terrified part of her wondered if it would be twice as painful if she were losing two of her soulmates at once. But the pain didn’t come. Reid and Morgan came stumbling from among the flames, and as awful as their coughing sounded, Emily found it almost beautiful.

                Because it meant they were alive. It meant their lungs were fighting off the smoke, and it meant she wouldn’t be feeling that pain again. Not today.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you enjoyed! Sorry I didn't get this up sooner. 
> 
> Next chapter won't be based on an episode, so you can look forward to that!


	14. Jennifer and Emily

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Discussions, featuring a rude interruption, a badass girlfriend, and a nervous JJ.

JJ was awake. She really shouldn’t have been, since she needed to go to work in the morning, and it was already past two, but it wasn’t every night that Emily was with her at her house. It wasn’t every night that she got the chance to just spend the night with her girlfriend – one of the lazy nights she’d always imagined having with her husband when she was little – even if her girlfriend just curled up on her bed and fell asleep. Especially when her girlfriend curled up and fell asleep next to her. 

She laughed a little thinking about the idea of “her husband” – something she couldn’t imagine anymore. When she was little, it was easy to dream about the boy she’d marry someday. It got harder for her as she got older, as she struggled to figure out which side of the aisle she should be imagining herself on – walking towards her husband or watching her wife walk towards her. It wasn’t until she met Emily that she felt sure. 

Yet when Emily had asked her, over a month ago, if she wanted to move in with her, JJ had been unsure of herself. Sure, they both lived at Rossi’s part-time, but that wasn’t really the same thing – all their soulmates lived in that house, at least part time. 

When JJ thought about what it would be like to live with Emily, she didn’t think of Rossi’s house as part of that. Their rooms there were almost… sacred. Rossi’s house was home for all seven of them, and it worked the way it was. That wouldn’t change if she and Emily were to move in together. Would it?  
\--

As the sun rose and Emily began to stir, JJ was desperately holding on to the last of the few hours she’d been able to sleep. Emily chuckled a little, watching her clutch the blankets like they were some lifeline that Emily couldn’t see. 

A few months ago, if someone had asked Emily where she and JJ would be, she wouldn’t have had an answer for them. There were too many unknowns and obstacles with JJ and her. Sure, they were soulmates, and the team knew about them, but neither of them wanted to risk anything by being too obvious at work. JJ was especially cautious, and Emily understood that, but it didn’t stop her from wishing all their mornings could be just like this one. 

Emily loved the mornings she got to wake up next to JJ. When they had a weekend off, they almost never went back to separate houses. Emily liked to stay at JJ’s house; it was less of a functional space and more of a home. Sometimes, Emily didn’t feel like her apartment was anything close to a home. It was an extension of the person she’d needed to be before she joined the team. It was a reflection of all her secrets and the paranoia that had to come with them for her to survive. 

JJ’s house, on the other hand, was a reflection of the woman she loved, and it was slowly becoming a reflection of the life they’d been slowly building together for months. When Emily walked in, she saw the same house she’d let herself into the night JJ called her about Battle, but she also saw a new home, one where her personality could shine through, even if she didn’t live there. 

A picture of her and JJ sat on the mantle, right next to one of the whole team. She’d helped JJ pick some of the newer decorations in the house, and they were nothing like her apartment. This felt like home to her in the same way her room at Rossi’s felt like home. 

Except for the fact that here, Emily got to watch JJ wake up. Here, she could give her girlfriend a kiss in the morning as she handed her a cup of coffee. Here, she didn’t have to worry about the bullpen rumor mill getting hold of her relationship. Here, she could just be Emily, JJ’s girlfriend, not SSA Emily Prentiss, responsible for protocols and keeping her relationship a secret from the powers that be. 

She wanted that to be every morning.

A couple months ago, she’d brought it up with JJ, who had given her a kiss and told her she didn’t quite feel ready. Emily understood that. She knew how cautious JJ was about work; living in the same place was a step that could raise some flags for the brass. She also knew that JJ would be ready to take that step eventually, whether the brass liked it or not. And Emily would be ready when JJ decided she was. 

\--

A reminder on JJ’s phone was what finally got her out of bed. She and Emily had a dinner reservation tonight, and to get to that dinner, JJ had to go to work, do her paperwork, and pray to anyone who might be listening that the team wouldn’t have a case today. 

The paperwork was dull. JJ passed along some consults, but nothing caught her eye as something the team needed to fly out for. As the pile of cases got smaller, JJ’s hope that she’d be able to go on her date got higher. 

She barely noticed when Emily brought her a cup of tea and sat in the chair opposite her desk. 

“So,” Emily waited for JJ’s attention to leave the case she was working on before she continued. “We have a reservation tonight.” 

“I have everything planned. The only thing left is whether the serial killers are going to leave us alone long enough for us to go.” 

“And are they?”

“I don’t see anything here that can’t be dealt with through consults, so I think today may be our lucky day.” 

“Perfect.” 

\--

The restaurant was elegant and low-profile, not somewhere a large group or a family with young children would go. For Emily and JJ, it was perfect. They chose a seat away from the windows, in a cozy corner of the restaurant. It was as private as they were going to get in public, and that was how they preferred it. 

After Emily ordered their wine, and they’d eat decided on a meal, Emily looked at JJ. 

“I didn’t even know this place existed before you told me about our reservations.” 

JJ laughed a little at that. “It’s one of Rossi’s favorites.” 

“Then it couldn’t have been cheap.”

“That’s not for you to worry about.” 

“And why is that?” 

“It’s a special occasion.” JJ smiled and reached for Emily’s hand. They held hands in silence for a moment, until they heard a scoff coming from a table a few feet behind Emily. Emily turned around as JJ looked over her shoulder, their fingers brushing against each other as Emily lost her grip on JJ’s hand. It was clear who had scoffed – only one of the three people at the table could see JJ or Emily – and the woman looked unapologetic. 

“I don’t understand why those people have to force their lifestyles on us… I mean, people have soulmates for a reason!” 

A younger girl, sitting across from the woman, slid down a little in her seat, like she was trying to avoid the older woman’s notice. The man sitting next to her, however, didn’t seem to have the same reservations. 

“You’re absolutely right, dear. We don’t need our daughter seeing people like that!” 

JJ thought that was a little odd as she looked at the girl she assumed was their daughter – she looked to be in her twenties, though JJ supposed she could have been seventeen or eighteen. Either way, she didn’t appear to need protecting from her and Emily’s relationship. 

Emily clearly had a similar thought process, because she quietly slipped out of her seat and discreetly whispered something to their waiter, who nodded. When Emily got back, she didn’t sit down at first. She addressed the couple. 

“I’m sorry, did something my soulmate and I did offend the two of you?” By Emily’s tone, it was clear that she wasn’t sorry, but she wasn’t in the mood to get into a shouting match. 

Unsurprisingly, it was the woman who replied. “Actually, you did. My family is trying to enjoy a meal together, and you’re ruining it. We don’t want to see that while we’re eating.” 

“I see. You don’t want to see me holding my soulmate’s hand. Let me guess, you think it’s unnatural?” 

“I’m glad we’re understanding each other.” The woman snapped.

“Oh, but we aren’t. I’m trying to enjoy dinner with my soulmate, and you seem to think you have more of a right to be here than I do. I did hear you say that soulmates exist for a reason, didn’t I?” 

“I don’t care if she’s your soulmate! It’s unnatural! Everyone knows you can be friends with a soulmate. The two of you disgust me!” Her voice had risen to a shout at this point, but Emily kept hers quiet and calm. 

“I know you can be friends with a soulmate. In fact, I’m very close friends with my other five soulmates.” Emily sat back down across from JJ and took her hand again, and she didn’t look back at the couple, who she was sure were fuming at this point. She ignored the woman’s shouting, as did JJ. 

The waiter, however, did not. 

“Ma’am, if you’re going to continue shouting at our other customers, I’m going to need to ask you to leave.” 

“Make them leave! They’re offensive to everyone here!” 

“I can have a manager ask you, if you’d prefer.” 

“No! We’re paying customers, and we aren’t going anywhere!” 

By the time the manager convinced the couple to leave the building, Emily and JJ had both finished their salads and were waiting for their main dish. As their daughter passed their table, she whispered, “I’m sorry I couldn’t stop them from saying that.” 

JJ gave her a smile. “It’s all right.” 

After the family was out of building, the manager appeared at their table. 

“I’m sorry for their behavior, both of you. Rest assured that they will not be allowed back here again.”

JJ replied, “Thank you for handing it so professionally.” 

When the manager was out of earshot, JJ directed her attention to Emily. “As I was saying before we were so rudely interrupted, it’s a special occasion.” 

“And what would that be?” 

JJ took Emily’s hand again. “I know you asked me this a couple months ago, but I wanted to ask if you’d move in with me.” 

Emily smiled. “I’d love to. You’re sure you’re ready?” 

“Absolutely. I know there are things we’d have to work out, but I want more mornings like this morning. I want to wake up next to you and bicker with you over the bathroom and have breakfast with you. I’m even willing to deal with you before you’ve had coffee.” 

“A true sacrifice,” Emily laughed.

“You’re worth it.”

“I’d hope so. Did you want to talk about the logistics tonight, or would you rather just enjoy my triumph over that couple?”

“As brilliant as that was, I think we should talk about it tonight. Who knows when we’ll get another evening to ourselves?” 

“That’s true. Are you thinking we move into your house or find somewhere else?” 

“I was thinking my house. Your lease is up soon, right?” 

“Right. We should also probably talk about Rossi’s house.” 

“Nothing changes there. That way we can have some distance if we need to.”

Emily nodded. “But we can’t use our rooms to hide from each other. That isn’t fair to us or to the others.” 

“Plus, it could be dangerous if we don’t deal with issues before we go into work.” 

“Exactly.”

Before the date, JJ had been nervous about the conversation. Now, with their plan solidified and the rude interruption removed, she was terrified. The “moving in” conversation wasn’t what scared JJ. That was resolved. What scared JJ was the logical next step from that. She knew Emily wouldn’t do anything dramatic like proposing tonight – as much as she tried to deny it, Emily was a sucker for proposals and all the romance that came with them. Until tonight, Emily hadn’t known that JJ was ready to live with her, let alone ready to marry her. 

The thing about that, though, was that JJ wanted to marry Emily. She wanted it so desperately that it pained her in a poetic way that made it more bearable, but no less painful. On the other hand, she didn’t want to do anything that would risk their team. She didn’t want anyone being reassigned, she didn’t want Hotch worrying about fraternization rules. She only wanted Emily, but how was she supposed to articulate every complex aspect of her thought process without sounding like an idiot? 

“You all right, JJ?” 

“Oh, yeah. I’m fine. Just thinking.” She tried to give Emily a reassuring smile, but Emily saw right through it.

“What’s on your mind?” 

JJ took a breath to steady herself. If there was anyone she was comfortable sounding like an idiot in front of, it was Emily. 

“I wanted to make sure we were on the same page…” 

“About?” 

“The biggest thing I wanted to talk about was marriage,” She took another breath. “I have a lot to say, so it might take a couple of tries to get it right.” 

“Okay. What’s bothering you?” 

“I wanted to make sure you know where I stand on all of it. Right now, I mean.” 

“Okay. Go for it. I’m right here.” 

“There is nothing that would make me happier than to marry you someday, but it’s not something I’m ready for now.” 

“You know I’m not going to propose to you until I know you’re ready to say yes, right?”

“Of course. But who says you’re the one who’s going to propose?” 

“Me. Right now. I call dibs.” 

“Touché,” JJ laughed. “Do you want to know my reasons?” 

“If you want to share, I’d love to listen. If not, I’d love to hold your hand and enjoy our bigot-free dessert. It’s up to you.”

“Mainly, the brass, but I’m sure you could’ve guessed that.” 

“Is that it?” 

“That’s most of what I can put into words right now. I just want you.” 

“You have me. I don’t care when the rings come into it, if they ever do. It’s our choice, and it’s one we’ll make together when the time comes.” 

“I love you, Em.”

“Love you, too.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Surprise! I'm not dead! 
> 
> It's been like two months and I'm so thankful for anyone who's stuck with me this long and for everyone who's commented or left kudos in the meantime. Your support is what keeps me going. 
> 
> In rereading, I've noticed that I've made lots of little errors. If they bug me enough, I might go change them. They're mostly grammar and spelling mistakes, so you shouldn't be worried about missing anything!
> 
> I made a tumblr for this fic! Come ask me questions or suggest things or just say hi! connecthedotsfic.tumblr.com


	15. Conversations

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The team, as a general rule, is terrible at having conversations. 
> 
> They have a lot of them anyway.

The BAU team was good at a lot of things, and the individual members were good at many more, but one thing that none of them could do to save their lives was have a conversation of their own accord. Luckily, they were very good at forcing each other to talk about the things that needed saying. 

JJ and Emily were the best at communicating with each other. Their conversations were rough around the edges and hard to get to sometimes, but they made it though most of them with little outside help. Occasionally, Reid would need to step in with JJ if she felt like she couldn’t talk to Emily about something, and Morgan often had to remind Emily that she didn’t have to keep everything to herself. With the rest of the team, both women pushed each other to have the discussions they needed, and they were always willing to provide the extra moral support, should one of them need it. 

Morgan was much better at coaxing conversations out of other people than he was at coaxing them out of himself. He respected the rest of the team as coworkers, and he loved them as soulmates, but even after years working with them, he found it difficult to trust anyone, though he was trying. He talked to Garcia about the things he could, and to his therapist about anything else he could manage. It was easiest for him to talk to Reid after Reid opened up about something himself, which wasn’t often. He talked to Hotch when forced, Rossi when he’d been drinking, and Emily when she was struggling. He’d learned that the best way to get Emily to talk was the same way Reid got him to talk. 

Hotch tended to avoid conversations until Rossi or Emily forced them out of him. He shared very little with his team out of a fear of hurting them with things he thought he should be handling on his own. Rossi knew this, and Emily was catching on quickly. Some of the best conversations for Hotch came after he’d finished dealing with something official – Emily had a half hour discussion with him once after talking to him for five minutes about her PTO. Rossi’s favorite strategy to get him to talk was to offer him a drink – only ever one, but the atmosphere of Rossi’s house was enough to get him talking. 

Rossi was another story. Hotch was one of the only people who knew when to push him and when to back off. The others had quickly learned that pushing at the wrong time made it certain that Rossi wouldn’t talk to them at all, and sometimes it was best to leave a gentle reminder, like JJ’s sunflowers. He’d talk to Hotch, though. They’d been through some of the best times and the worst together, and they knew how to handle their conversations. They generally went more smoothly than JJ and Emily’s but were harder to start. 

Garcia would talk as long as someone was there to remind her that she didn’t have to take care of everyone else before she took care of herself. JJ or Morgan was usually the best person for this job, and it wasn’t uncommon for Derek to drop by her office with some coffee, or for JJ to offer some tea. On cases, Morgan checked in on her the most, since JJ was often too busy dealing with the press to call. However, while Morgan sometimes rushed straight home after a case was over, JJ could be found every time, without fail, having a cup of tea in Garcia’s office before they both went home for the night. 

Reid was willing to talk to his team, as long as he was sure they wanted him to talk to them, which wasn’t often. As a result, he tended to be most open with JJ and Garcia, who both loved to drop by his desk for a chat whenever they weren’t in their own offices. With both of them, their being open with their vulnerabilities always made it easier for him to be open with his. When Hotch or Morgan made the effort, he’d talk to them, too. Hotch sometimes tried to force conversations and Morgan often struggled with making his feelings known, which didn’t work well with Reid. He appreciated their efforts, though, and when he could, he tried to return them. 

\--

The Wednesday after JJ and Emily’s date (and Emily’s victory over the homophobic couple), JJ and Emily had a quick conversation in JJ’s office, in which they decided that they would tell the rest of the team about their plans to move in together. Despite its brevity, their conversation was peppered with as much affection as JJ was comfortable with at work. 

\--

The week had been quiet; they hadn’t had any cases since the previous Wednesday, when they’d all gone straight from the plane to Rossi’s house at close to midnight. JJ and Emily were grateful for this, because it meant tonight would be a quiet one. While everyone needed the nights where secrets and pain and everything else they couldn’t handle came out in the open, they also needed the nights where they could simply be a family. 

Rossi and Garcia finished moving the dishes from the dining room to Rossi’s porch. It had been Garcia’s idea. Usually, they ate in Rossi’s kitchen, chattering away while Rossi finished up whatever he was making. Today, though, the night was too warm to resist the lure of the glass table on the porch, where they could see the sun as it set and the stars as they appeared. 

Once everyone was sitting down and all the dishes had been arranged to Rossi’s satisfaction, Emily started.

“JJ and I have some news for you.”

Everyone looked from Emily, to JJ, back to Emily. No one said anything. Not necessarily for fear of getting it wrong; they just wanted to give their soulmates the chance to use their own words. 

JJ was the one who said it, knowing that Emily had almost as much of a flair for the dramatic as Dave. “We’re moving in together!” 

“Finally,” Morgan laughed. 

“Hey, eyebrows, don’t forget you owe me ten dollars.”

“Congratulations, you two,” Aaron said. 

“Yeah, congrats!” Reid added. 

Rossi was suspiciously quiet through the whole exchange, and Emily rounded on him. “Something you wanted to tell us, Rossi?”

JJ laughed, “Did you make a bet?” 

Morgan and Garcia started laughing. Emily shot them a look. “Don’t think I didn’t already know about your bet, Derek.” 

“Don’t look at me, Penelope gave it away!”

“Actually, Morgan, that was all you.” Garcia held back a giggle as JJ explained how she’d been outside Garcia’s office the whole time they were making their bet. 

This was the type of conversation that was easiest for everyone. The banter came lightly and easily, and no one was under a microscope. These were the nights they felt most removed from their jobs without also feeling isolated from their family. As the dinner broke up, everyone felt lighter than they had in a while. 

Morgan, Garcia, and Reid all decided to head home, since it was still early, and they’d gotten used to sleeping in their own beds again. JJ and Emily went back to JJ’s house and spent the entire trip back talking about how their home together would look. When Emily fell asleep in JJ’s armchair that night, JJ remembered the night she’d fallen asleep in that chair with Emily watching over her. The memory brought a smile to her face, and she perched on the arm of the chair, letting her head rest on Emily’s shoulder. 

Aaron chose to spend the night with Rossi. This didn’t come as a surprise to Dave, since he knew Jack was with his mother. They cleared the table in silence, and before Aaron could escape to his room, Dave had poured two drinks and was sitting in one of the chairs in his living room. Aaron took a deep breath and took the seat opposite him. 

“It’s been a quiet week.” 

Aaron nodded in agreement but said nothing. Dave had a look on his face, the one that made Aaron sure that they were going to have a serious conversation, whether he   
liked it or not. So, instead of trying to make small talk with Dave, he waited. If Dave was going to rope him into a conversation, he’d have to start it.

Dave, of course, knew what Aaron was thinking. It was how they worked. Forcing conversations out of each other was never a matter of small talk becoming more serious, it was always a matter of sitting down together with the intention of having a discussion. Even if only one person was aware of it going in, their conversations always started this way. 

“Aaron, you need to do something about Reid.” 

“Excuse me?” Wherever this conversation was headed, Aaron was already on guard.

“The only people who can’t see how you feel about each other is you, and him.” 

This conversation was _definitely_ not going the way Aaron wanted it to. He stayed silent long enough for Dave to continue. “What? You thought you could hide your feelings from five profilers who also happen to be your _soulmates_? I thought you were smarter than that, Aaron.” 

“Just because you know me so well doesn’t mean the rest of them can tell.” 

“You know the bets that Garcia, Morgan and I had about when JJ and Prentiss would move in together?” When Aaron nodded, Dave continued. “Everyone on the team, save you and Reid, have taken bets as to how long it’s going to take the two of you to get your act together.” 

“How long has this been going on?” Aaron asked, with a hint of annoyance in his voice. 

“Since Emily caught you crying in your office. When Reid faced off with Owen Savage.” 

Aaron looked up from where his drink had held his attention. Softly, he admitted, “I didn’t think anyone saw that.”

“Just talk to him.” 

“If he’s as oblivious as you claim, why should he believe me?” 

“Have you met Penelope Garcia?” 

\--

Aaron was right about one thing: Spencer Reid was completely oblivious to Aaron’s feelings. When Aaron found this out, he was simultaneously relieved and nervous. Morgan and Garcia, however, were nothing except frustrated, because while Rossi was grilling Hotch, they had the lovely task of attempting to get Reid to go to a bar with them. 

Their plan was fairly similar to Rossi’s with Hotch; buy Reid a drink, sit with him for a while, then ambush him about his feelings. 

They’d known about Reid’s feelings for Hotch almost as long as they’d known Reid. It had been clear from the beginning that Reid had a little bit of a crush on Aaron. Back then, everyone had written it off as admiration, or a youthful crush that Reid would eventually grow out of. 

Hotch had been able to keep his feelings under wraps for longer, with his attention focused on desperately attempting to rescue a failing marriage, trying to be a man he wasn’t for Haley’s sake. Shortly after the divorce, after Emily had seen Hotch break down over the idea of losing Reid, everyone except Reid had figured out Hotch’s feelings for him. 

Throughout it all, though, neither of them had been able to figure out the depth of their own feelings, let alone the fact that they were reciprocated. So, the rest of the team planned out a kind of intervention. Rossi would have a chat with Aaron, Morgan and Garcia with Reid. Not a problem. 

By the time they got as far as getting Reid to the bar, it was almost midnight, and Reid looked almost ready to collapse. Morgan was, surprisingly, the more sympathetic of the two. Despite Garcia’s protests that they needed to talk, Morgan drove back to Reid’s apartment rather than keeping him hostage at the bar. 

“Garcia, if this can’t wait until tomorrow, I have some tea in my apartment?” Reid offered this nervously, like he had an idea of the conversation that was coming. 

“Are you sure, Reid?” Morgan asked. “I’m pretty sure this can wait.” 

“And I’m pretty sure that when Garcia wants something, she gets it, so let’s go upstairs before you guys keep me up until two in the morning.” 

Once they were safely in Reid’s kitchen, with mugs of tea in front of everyone, Morgan started talking. 

“We’ve all seen how you look at Hotch, kid.” 

“What?”

“You don’t have to deny it. You know we don’t have a problem with it.” Garcia said. 

“What are you two talking about?”

“You’ve looked up to him since you joined the team. But you also look at him like he’s everything. You’re lucky he’s almost as oblivious as you, because if he wasn’t, he’d have figured you out a long time ago.”

“He’s always had Haley.”

“Which is why none of us could see how he felt about you until recently.” Garcia said. 

This caught Reid’s attention. “How he _what_?” 

“Kid, we can’t talk to him for you.” 

“But you can talk to me for him?” 

“No,” Garcia corrected. “We’re talking sense into you. It’s not the same thing.”

“…sure it isn’t.” 

“Just think about it, okay Reid?” Garcia asked. 

“How could I not with what you just told me?”


	16. Alone

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Based on Demonology, so Emily suffers a lot, but she has people to help her.

Emily could feel herself breaking from the moment she heard the words. 

“He’s dead, Emily.” 

Before she’d left the bar, she already felt like an important part of her was missing, and she could only think of one thing to do: go to the office. By the time she arrived, Garcia had already found everything she’d asked for. _Of course she has,_ Emily thought bitterly. _She always does._

When she got to the doorway of Hotch’s office, she didn’t think she could hurt more than she already was, but for some reason, hearing Hotch ask her to let the team help felt like someone had stabbed her. She could only whisper her thanks and head back out into the rain. 

She couldn’t bring herself to go back home. She couldn’t bring herself to explain to JJ why she’d been out so late when she knew she couldn’t do it without breaking down. Alone was the only was Emily had ever known how to deal with these things. Even asking Hotch for permission to investigate the case or asking Garcia for help finding information was difficult for her, and after everything that had happened that night, Emily was sure she wouldn’t be able to handle another person who loved her worrying about her. It always made her feel like something was off, like she couldn’t quite believe that this many people genuinely cared about her. It was easier to process when one or two people offered to help. Having six people willing to drop everything to help her with something (that might be nothing) was something entirely new to Emily. 

So, she stayed out. She didn’t mean to go anywhere in particular. She passed by a few of the team’s favorite bars and restaurants but didn’t stop outside any of them. Eventually, she found her way back to the office, where she’d left her car while she went to wallow in her misery. 

For one fleeting moment, she considered just sleeping in her car, but the idea of being that exposed made it too terrifying to consider taking advantage of the solitude it would give her. Besides, she had a warm bed and a home waiting for her, and if JJ wasn’t awake waiting for her, Emily would have been worried for her health. Without any enthusiasm, Emily climbed into her car and drove into the night, towards her other safe haven. Home. 

JJ knew something was wrong the minute Emily came home in the middle of the night with snowflakes in her hair and a grim look on her face. The old alarm clock in their living room, with its angry red numbers, declared that it was two-thirty in the morning. Before JJ could say anything, Emily swept up to their bedroom without a word. JJ was a little scared. Anything that could have Emily coming home this late, in this kind of mood was not a good thing. 

As the numbers on the clock switched to 2:33, JJ couldn’t help but think that the clock made things a lot more ominous. When Emily was in a better mood, she’d ask her if they could move “Getting a new clock for the living room” up on their to-do list. For now, all she could do was hope that Emily would manage to get some sleep and try to get a few hours herself. 

In the morning, Emily was feeling equal measures of grief, guilt, anger, and fear. Matthew was dead, and she still couldn’t wrap her mind around what had happened. She had a case file on “Tommy V.” still waiting for her in her car, and a million possibilities of what Matthew had been involved with running through her mind. The facts were easy enough to grasp; she’d seen worse in hundreds, maybe thousands of case files, but to connect that precise and removed language to such an important person to her? Impossible. 

Watching JJ wake up usually brought Emily a sense of normalcy or peace, but this morning, watching her girlfriend desperately cling to sleep when Emily knew she was the reason JJ hadn’t gotten much more than a couple hours’ rest only made her feel worse. Some people might have felt better knowing that there was someone watching out for them, who cared about them more than they cared about a full night’s sleep, but Emily had never been one of those people. An hour of sleep lost over her was always something that she owed someone, something that she needed to repay, no matter how many times JJ told her that coming home safely was all Emily would ever need to do to make it up to her. 

As if that wasn’t enough to be grappling with, Emily was afraid. Afraid of finding out what Matthew had done, afraid of not knowing, afraid of revealing too much to her team. And with the fear came anger. Whatever Matthew had done might have gotten him killed, and now Emily was left to find out exactly what that was and whether her hunch was correct. She was angry with herself for not being able to except her team’s offer of help, for being afraid, for worrying JJ, and for a hundred other things. 

\--

Sometimes Prentiss wondered how much the “no profiling your team members” rule was being followed on her team, because Rossi knew way too much to have not been profiling her. She had to admit, though, that she was glad he was as skilled at profiling as he was, because everything he’d done for her since Matthew died had been dead on. Exactly what she needed him to do. 

As much as she hated admitting it, telling the story had helped. Even though it was cold enough that her coffee didn’t do much to help her stay warm, and Rossi had taken her to an empty lot to talk to her in freezing weather. Rossi had perfected a kind of non-judgement that was exactly what she needed as she told the story about Matthew. Everything she told him felt like a weight being lifted, something she could finally forgive herself for now that someone else knew about it. Now that she had a way to give Matthew peace in death, she had the chance to stop blaming herself for his issues in life. 

Not to mention the fact that Rossi was far more willing to take risks than Hotch was. She understood that he was responsible for the team, and that sometimes being Unit Chief and being their soulmate couldn’t happen at the same time, but it didn’t mean she had to like it. It also didn’t mean she couldn’t be incredibly grateful for Rossi when he decided to throw the protocol out the window to help her save John. 

Rossi was also the one who told her about the risk Hotch had ultimately taken for her, though she suspected he was, to an extent, trying to make Hotch look good by doing it. Not that she blamed him. She didn’t really like having two of her soulmates argue either. Whether she had the details right or not, the fact that Hotch made the phone call at all meant the world to her. 

Accepting that the team had her best interests at heart and that they were willing to fight for her had taken her a long time. Over a year, in fact. But now that she had, she felt more peaceful than she had since she was fifteen, and Matthew had been the one person she could trust. He was gone, and she wouldn’t be done accepting that for a while. But she had six people firmly on her side, supporting her, and that was something she hadn’t had when she was fifteen and afraid. 

She was still afraid, in a way. Of very different things, of course, but she was still afraid. She was learning that with having people came the possibility of losing them. She was learning what it felt like to be loved and to love someone unconditionally, for no reason other than that they were them. JJ was teaching her what it felt like to come home to a house that felt warm and safe and nothing like her mother had made her feel when they lived in so many places. 

Her team was teaching her how to be strong and when to be vulnerable and that there were places for each. And, looking back, she couldn’t figure out how she’d lived without them for so long.  
\--

The kitchen in the house she shared with JJ was empty and cold, not having been used for several days while its occupants were away, but it was the most welcoming place she’d seen in days. The room immediately warmed up as she filled the electric kettle and turned it on, and JJ went searching for clean mugs and Emily’s favorite tea. The silvery clock Emily had brought with her when she moved in hung above the sink. No angry red numbers in sight. 

This was where Emily sat and told JJ the whole story. They drank their tea together, JJ listening, prompting Emily to continue when she stopped talking and started stirring her tea. The story was less broken up than when she’d told it to Rossi, took less coaxing to get it out of her, but it had a nervousness that hadn’t been there when she was telling it the first time. She stopped, apparently finished with her story. 

JJ looked at her. “Is that all?” 

“That’s the story.”

“That’s not what I meant. Is that all you wanted to tell me?” 

Emily looked at her tea. 

“I’m sorry I scared you the other night.”

“Just come home safe, Em. That’s all I’ve ever asked of you.” JJ paused. “But you could try not to make a habit of it?”

Emily laughed a little. “I could probably manage that.” 

“Is that all that was bothering you?” 

“I was fifteen. I couldn’t tell anyone, especially not my mom…”

“Em, you don’t have to justify it. It was your choice, and you did what you needed to.”

“I know that, I just…” Emily trailed off. “I didn’t want you to think that meant I wasn’t open to kids. Maybe not now, but…”

“Later?” 

“Being pregnant was terrifying, and I’m not sure I’d ever want to repeat that part. But I want _everything_ with you.” 

“Emily.” JJ started, reaching for her hand. “I love you. You’re my family now. And when we’re ready for it, we’ll do it together. I promise.” 

Emily took a deep breath, then let it out. “I love you so much, JJ. You know that?” 

“I know.” JJ smiled. “It’s late. We should get some sleep.” 

“You read my mind.” Emily reached for JJ’s hand.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have a tumblr for this fic now! You can find me and yell at me next time I don't update for two months at connectthedotsfic.tumblr.com!  
> Thanks so much for reading! Your support means the world to me


	17. Can't Hold On Forever

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hotch suffers a lot. Morgan suffers a little. Everyone tries to help. (Based on Omnivore)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know it's been a hot minute since I updated. This chapter is a little shorter than I would have liked, but none of the other scenes I had planned fit well at the end.   
> Thank you so much for your patience. Your support means the world to me.

On the nights the team wasn’t on an active case, most of them left as early as they could, trying to maximize the time they could spend at home before they got called away on yet another case. Reid was one of two exceptions to this rule, and the only person who was almost always an exception. 

Hotch was the other, when Jack was with his mom. When Hotch was in Virginia and Jack was supposed to be with him, he was usually the first person out the door. As soon as his paperwork was either done or given to Rossi or Prentiss, he was gone. Usually, Rossi would take his last few papers once he noticed Hotch’s impatience or remembered it was his time with Jack. With them, it was subtle, the “thank you” implied and without an attempt to refuse the offer. With Prentiss, he put up more of a fight. 

Dave had convinced him long ago that Hotch wasn’t keeping him from anything by giving him a couple more forms. With Prentiss, she and JJ would often leave together, and Hotch was reluctant to get in the way of their time together, knowing how limited it was already. Sometimes Prentiss would show up with some of his paperwork already finished instead of trying to ask for some of the work, and sometimes she would sneak a few files from his desk when he left his office. Either way, when Prentiss was helping him, Hotch would find a few files, done well and sitting on his desk, then he’d realize he was finished about an hour before he thought he would be. 

Tonight, though, Hotch and Reid were the last two in the office. Reid sat at his desk in the bullpen, reading through case files and writing up his reports, while Hotch filled out the last of his paperwork as the clock neared ten. They finished around the same time and both headed towards the elevator, Hotch holding the door for Reid, who was a few steps behind. 

“You’re here late.” 

“So are you.” 

“I have reports.” 

“Unit Chief reports or normal profiler reports?” 

“Both. And I could point out that you have the same paperwork as everyone else, but I won’t.” 

“I’m pretty sure you just did, Hotch.” 

“None of them are here this late. And Prentiss and Rossi steal my paperwork.” 

“Prentiss has someone to go home to. And Rossi is… Rossi.” 

They didn’t say anything else as they walked out to Hotch’s car. It took Hotch less than ten seconds to realize that Reid’s car wasn’t in the parking structure, and it wasn’t much of a leap to figure out that Reid would be taking the metro home. 

“Want me to drop you at home?” 

“Jack?” 

“Haley has him. It’s no trouble.” 

Reid considered for a moment. “Sure. Thanks, Hotch.” 

Neither man said much on the way to Reid’s apartment. Both of them spent the drive wondering how to broach the subject of the conversations they’d had with their soulmates, and neither one figured out how best to bring it up. Reid let himself into the building, and Hotch drove off once he couldn’t see Reid. 

They both spent the rest of the night wondering how they were supposed to “get their act together,” as Dave so eloquently put it. 

Hotch resolved to say something to Reid the next night – after all, Haley had Jack again, so they’d probably end up the last two in the office again. The next night, though, he found himself on a rainy street in Boston, trying to make sense of Shaunessy’s decision and make a plan at the same time, and failing at both. 

Everything about this case had stuck with him for ten years. This new part, to him, made all kinds of sense. For someone as obsessed with control as the Reaper was? It fit perfectly. The Reaper’s actions were completely understandable to Hotch, but Shaunessy’s weren’t. 

Hotch often felt fear; routinely putting his life on the line made that an occupational hazard. Occasionally, he felt brief moments of terror. Knowing that one of his teammates was in immediate danger scared him far more than confronting an unsub. Coming back to a home without Jack, given the right circumstances, made him so restless and uneasy he’d woken Haley on more than one occasion, asking to talk to him, to make sure he was all right. 

It wasn’t often that Hotch experienced the combination of total confidence and paralyzing unease that came with the Boston Reaper case. His job was to understand the why of it – why the unsubs committed their crimes, why they would eventually be captured. He supposed it was also his job to understand how the investigators might be helpful or a hinderance. This, though, was completely unprecedented. He’d never encountered a situation like it. After ten years of constant profiling, Hotch thought he understood the Reaper – an understanding that did not make him confident the Reaper would be captured. 

In those ten years, he’d never considered that the Reaper’s dormancy could have been caused by something as monumentally reckless as what Shaunessy had done. He’d never thought he’d have to profile someone on his side, and he hated the idea that he couldn’t rely on the locals to at least be predictable to a degree. 

When the team arrived in Boston and explained the Shaunessy letter, the locals were more than cooperative. Hotch’s unease began to dissolve – Shaunessy’s actions were not indicative of those of these Boston police officers, and the Reaper’s actions were something Hotch could use to catch him. He was focused, until everything fell apart. 

After the Reaper went after a bus full of people and left Foyet’s addresses on the windows, Hotch felt like he couldn’t breathe. Until George Foyet was in custody, Hotch couldn’t focus on anything else. 

And when he escaped, it felt like everything came crashing down. Nothing anyone said to him made it past the guilt that seemed to surround him. No matter how effective Rossi had been next to the bus, he couldn’t get through to Hotch again. Reid, JJ, and Emily all took their turns trying to coax Hotch out of his head, but none of them could get through to him. 

Emily eventually settled for gently taking a few of his files off the stack and flashing a sympathetic look. JJ had her own work to finish, and one pointed stare from Hotch was enough to get her to back down, however little she wanted to. 

Reid was harder to get rid of. Not only did Foyet’s escape surround them like a hurricane, their earlier conversation felt like a wall, and Reid was determined to break it down. Where it took only a few minutes to convince Emily and JJ to leave him alone, it took Reid more than half an hour, and he only gave up then because Hotch surrendered the last of his files and promised he’d try to rest. 

As it turned out, he really did try. After this case had interrupted his silent promise to say something, anything, to Reid, breaking such a simple promise was more than he could handle. So he didn’t break it. He left it intact – one of the only things in his life that still was. 

After convincing Hotch to go home for the night, Reid went off in search of JJ, Emily, and Garcia. He found them surrounding Morgan’s desk, trying to convince him that the last few files could wait until morning. 

“No. He had me. I’m not giving him any more of a lead than he already has.” 

“Morgan,” Prentiss started. 

He interrupted her. “He had me, Emily. Nothing any of you say to me can change that.” 

“Derek, you’re alive,” JJ said.

“Only because he wanted me to see him before he killed me.”

“Yeah? Well that was his mistake, then,” JJ shot back. 

“Just go home, all of you.” 

Reid gave him a look. “You should know us well enough to know that none of us are leaving until you do.” 

“He’s right.” Emily smiled. “So either give us some of that paperwork you have, or file it away for tomorrow. I’m not sitting here all night watching you do it all.”


	18. Names (Part 1)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The team has a slow day. People have feelings. Penelope, JJ, and Emily make a plan.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's been a while! This chapter is shorter than most of the others, but I hope you enjoy it anyway!

The bullpen wasn’t always a serious place. Sometimes, the days were quiet. 

Sometimes JJ joined Reid, Morgan and Prentiss at their desks. As she’d told Elle all those years ago, she never was in her office. On days like this, when all they had was paperwork and the occasional consult, they didn’t talk much. When they did, it was without any trace of the serious tone they all adopted when they briefed cases before flying off to some city with a series of horrible crimes and a local police force at their wits’ end. 

Morgan spun around in his chair. “Hey, Pretty Boy. Do you have any files that need to go to Hotch?” 

Reid shook his head. “Not yet. Thanks, Morgan.” 

“What about me, Derek?” Prentiss tried to sound hurt, but she couldn’t hide her smile from JJ or Garcia, let alone from Reid or Morgan. “Don’t you care about me?” 

“Nice try, Emily.”

JJ spoke up from her perch at Emily’s desk. “Don’t worry, Em, I care about you even if Derek doesn’t.” 

Emily turned back to her girlfriend and grinned. “Don’t worry, babe. I know you do.” She shot Derek a fake dirty look as he went up the stairs and into their Unit Chief’s office. He knocked twice, and opened the door. 

Hotch looked up from the file he was working on. Morgan held up the file before he put it on Hotch’s desk with the rest of the team’s finished files from the day. “I’ve only got a couple more files. Anything I can take off your hands?” 

“I’ve got it.” Hotch indicated the file he was working on. “This is my last one. I’m pretty sure Dave came in here earlier and stole some while I wasn’t paying attention.” 

When Morgan left the office, he didn’t go back to his desk. Instead, he walked down the hallway and into Garcia’s office, without knocking. 

“How many times do I have to tell you people,” she grumbled, “not to come into my office without knocking first!” She turned around in her chair, clearly ready to go after the intruder. Upon seeing Morgan, her expression softened.

He grinned at her. “Come on, baby girl. I don’t deserve whatever you have planned.”

“Oh, you don’t deserve it? Then what are you doing here? Not that your presence isn’t welcome. I’d never turn down an opportunity to see the objective physical perfection that is SSA Derek Morgan.” 

“And I’d never turn down an opportunity to come visit you. I’m on my last file, figured I’d drop by and say hi.” 

“Well, hi.” 

“Hi.” 

Garcia pulled out the chair that usually sat, unoccupied, in front of her less-used monitors, but sometimes held Kevin Lynch, and motioned for Derek to sit down. He did, without argument, but Garcia explained herself anyway. 

“This is what you get for telling me that you aren’t busy. We need to talk.”

Morgan sighed. He should have known that Garcia wasn’t going to let him off the hook for what had happened with Foyet. “Baby girl, I’m fine. I talked with Emily and Reid.” 

“One, that isn’t what this is about. Two, no you didn’t I asked them. Three, we will absolutely be talking about that later, but right now we need to talk about Reid.” 

“What about him? We already cornered him and told him to talk to Hotch.” 

“We did. And it has recently come to my attention that they’re not the only ones in need of an intervention.” 

“Who else? JJ and Emily clearly have their shit together.”

Garcia stared at him. “You really have no idea.” 

“What?” 

“For someone who claims to be good at reading people, you’re kinda terrible at reading yourself, Derek.”

Derek was so confused he couldn’t come up with a witty retort or flirty nickname to throw back at Garcia, so he let her keep talking. 

“You look at Reid the same way he looks at Hotch,” she explained. 

“And you didn’t think to tell me that before I helped plot to get them together?” Morgan snapped. 

“I thought you knew,” she replied. “You’ve never said anything to anyone, so I assumed you wanted me to stay out of it. But you’re still staring at him, after we sent him after Hotch. What gives?” 

“Who else knows about this?” 

“JJ and Emily, for sure. Other than that, I don’t know. Hotch might not. He’s kind of terrible at seeing things like that when they involve him.” 

Morgan gave her a bitter laugh. “And Rossi made him see Reid. It’s probably for the best, anyway.” 

Garcia looked at him. “What do you mean?” 

“There’s not much point in going after someone who doesn’t see you that way.” 

“Who says he doesn’t see you that way?” 

“Why would he?” Morgan slumped back in the chair. “It’s not like he’s done anything about it. And I’m not exactly boyfriend material, Baby Girl.”

“I know of at least a dozen girls who would wholeheartedly disagree with that.” 

“The ones who show up for a date or two and then never speak to me again?” 

Garcia moved her chair closer to him, and even though she was a few inches shorter than him, she could look him in the eye from her desk chair. She’d have never been able to pull off the glare she gave him standing up, but here, in her office, she was in control. She stared him down for a few moments, then sat back in her chair. 

“That’s not you not being boyfriend material, Derek, that’s you being so obviously afraid of commitment that a non-profiler can see it from a mile away.” 

“Pretty sure that’s a deal-breaker, Mama. Fear of commitment is like, the single easiest way to make someone not boyfriend material.”

“What are you going to do about it, Derek?”

“He’s going after Hotch, which, can I remind you, is something we put him up to?”

Morgan got up to leave Garcia’s office, and she let him. Maybe later. Maybe later, she’d be able to convince Morgan that he was worth more than a date or two. She just needed some time to come up with a better plan. And to do that, she needed more brainpower. 

Without putting much thought into it, she sent a text to two of the women she trusted the most.  
-

When JJ got a text from Garcia, it was usually something a little more urgent than, “My office, bring tea.” Which is why she wasn’t expecting see exactly that text gracing her phone screen around four in the afternoon. Four in the afternoon texts were usually something more like, “We have a case and I’m about to ruin all of your weekend plans,” and they were usually coming from JJ, not Penelope. In any case, she rounded up her last few stray case files and headed into Garcia’s office, thinking she’d drop them by Hotch’s office on her way back to her desk once Garcia was done with her. 

As she got to the door, she realized that she’d forgotten the tea Garcia asked for, but before she’d finished turning around to go get it, Emily had appeared at the door, holding an electric kettle in one hand and three mugs in the other, a box of tea precariously balanced on top of the mugs. JJ almost knocked the mugs out of her hands in her surprise, but managed to avoid the collision, instead taking the tea and mugs out of Emily’s hands so she could concentrate on the tea kettle which had clearly just finished boiling. 

JJ let out a sigh of exasperation. Emily always did this, whether it was with breakfast at home or trying to surprise JJ with lunch in her office. Before she could say anything, Garcia appeared at the door and shooed them inside. There was only one extra chair, but before Garcia could start to apologize, JJ had perched on the side of one of the tables. Problem solved. Well, problem one. Garcia still hadn’t told them why they were there.

 

While the girls were talking, Morgan stole files from Emily’s desk. It wasn’t something he’d normally have done, but his head was spinning and paperwork was a good way to distract himself. He flipped through the folders somewhat absentmindedly – after all, there wasn’t any pressure to get Emily’s paperwork done – looking for something complex enough that he could keep his mind occupied and away from the things Penelope had said to him. 

She wasn’t exactly wrong about everything. She was definitely right about his fear of commitment, and she might have been right about Reid – even Morgan didn’t really know where he stood with Reid. On one hand, Reid seemed more than happy to go after Hotch in his own way and his own time, and Morgan didn’t want to get in the way of that. And there was also the little detail of Morgan definitely not being gay. He’d never consciously thought of Reid that way, but of course, an annoying voice in the back of his head reminded him that the subconscious existed, too. _And,_ he admitted, _Penelope is pretty good at reading people. She deals with all of us all the time._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's been a little over a year since I started this adventure, and i'm so grateful for the support I've gotten. I wrote this fic because I couldn't find one like it to read, so I hope someone else finds what they're looking for in it. I'm hoping to get chapters out a little more consistently in the new year, and I'm hoping to get a sort of "part 2" to this chapter done in the next couple days.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! If there are any warnings you think need to be tagged, please don’t hesitate to let me know! Warnings will be in the notes at the beginning of each chapter. I’ll be discussing a lot of canon events in this fic, and if anyone needs it, i’ll be more than happy to write up an undetailed summary of a chapter, just let me know!


End file.
